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THROUGH  COLLEGE 
ON   NOTHING  A  YEAR 


THROUGH  COLLEGE 
ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

LITERALLY  RECORDED 
FROM  A  STUDENT'S  STQRY 

BY 

CHRISTIAN    GAUSS 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES    SCRIBNER'S    SONS 

1915 


^ 


Copyright,  1915,  by 
CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


Published  October,  19 15 


A  POOR  RETURN  FOR  SERVICE  RICHLY  GIVEN,  THIS 
PLAIN  ACCOUNT  OF  LIFE  AT  PRINCETON  UNIVERSITY 
IS  DEDICATED  BY  BOTH  THE  SPEAKER  AND  HIS 
SCRIBE  TO  THAT  LOYAL  SON  OF  HIS  ALMA  MATER, 
GEORGE     MCFARLANE     GALT,     IN     RECOGNITION 


PREFACE 

The  reader  of  this  volume  is  eavesdropping 
on  what  we  hope  will  prove  to  be  for  him  an  in- 
teresting and  profitable  story  of  real  life.  And 
this  brief  preface  is  designed  to  apprise  him  more 
fully  of  his  privileges  and  status. 

The  informality  of  the  following  narrative  will 
in  all  probability  be  a  sufficient  indication  that 
the  experiences  here  so  frankly  revealed  were 
not  in  the  first  instance  intended  for  any  larger 
public,  or  for  a  public  at  all.  Such  is  indeed  the 
case.  Had  I  at  that  time  intimated  to  the  very 
busy  and  matter-of-fact  young  man  here  con- 
cerned that  he  was  to  become  the  "hero"  of  a 
printed  book,  I  feel  sure  that  in  spite  of  old 
acquaintance  he  would  have  looked  upon  me 
askance  and  have  avoided  my  questions  with  sus- 
picion. Of  any  such  fate  he  had,  for  these  times, 
a  somewhat  unusually  healthy  horror.  I  feel  it 
my  duty,  therefore,  to  remove  this  seeming  curse 

vii 


viii  PREFACE 

which,  as  a  result  of  unforeseen  circumstances  I 
have  in  a  sort  brought  upon  him;  for  it  should 
be  understood  at  the  outset  that  the  story  is 
now  presented  with  the  narrator's  as  well  as  the 
writer's  sanction. 

A  whole  school  of  philosophers  holds  that  there 
can  be  no  changes  in  our  world  which  are  not 
somehow  known  or  experienced  by  the  human 
mind  and  soul.  Man,  they  tell  us,  is  the  measure 
of  all  things.  This  problem,  in  deference,  we 
must  leave  with  them.  It  will  be  plain  even  to 
the  lay  mind,  however,  that  conditions  in  colleges 
cannot  change,  or  even  exist,  without  affecting 
the  lives  of  individual  students,  and  as  a  result 
of  this  embarrassing  fact,  which  a  philosopher 
might  have  foreseen  but  which  we  did  not,  what 
began  as  an  impersonal  investigation  of  conditions 
has  become  this  frankly  personal  narrative  and 
confession. 

A  university  publication  had  planned  a  series  of 
articles  on  the  opportunities  offered  to  and  the 
methods  employed  by  that  increasing  number  of 
students  who  are  earning  their  way  through  col- 
lege.   In  gathering  the  facts  for  such  an  investi- 


PREFACE  ix 

gation  I  naturally  turned  to  students  so  situated, 
and  in  particular  to  the  young  man  of  our  story, 
for  he  was  well  known  to  me  personally  and  had 
at  this  time  nearly  finished  his  college  course 
with  no  assistance  from  outside.  With  him  I 
had  a  number  of  most  informal  conferences  on 
nearly  all  the  phases  of  this  problem,  and  he  very 
willingly  told  me  of  his  own  ventures  and  ex- 
periences, believing  that  he  could  thus  be  of  as- 
sistance to  others  who  were  or  would  later  be  in 
a  position  like  his  own;  for  many  of  his  difficul- 
ties were  due,  as  his  story  will  show,  to  ignorance 
of  conditions  which  he  was  called  upon  to  face, 
and  which  he  indicated  and  explained.  Un- 
known and  with  no  prospect  of  financial  assist- 
ance, he  had,  as  the  result  of  a  boyish  determina- 
tion, suddenly  found  himself  upon  a  college 
campus,  where,  in  an  utterly  strange  world,  like 
the  man  from  Mars,  he  for  some  time  had  the 
sense  of  being  an  interloper  in  a  stranger's  house. 
He  labored  under  yet  other  handicaps  particularly 
severe,  which  even  an  American  lad  of  foreign 
parentage,  born  in  the  slums,  would  not  be  called 
upon  to  face.    These  he  never  discussed  but  ac- 


x  PREFACE 

cepted  so  much  as  a  matter  of  course  that  no  hint 
of  them  is  conveyed  in  his  cheerful  narrative. 
Suffice  it  to  say  that  his  case  was  extreme;  it 
presented  every  possible  difficulty  and  the  odds 
could  not  have  been  heavier  against  him.  Evi- 
dently, if  he  could  succeed,  the  way  was  open  to 
any  young  man  of  equal  determination,  though 
it  should  be  added  that  his  was  a  determination 
and  fixity  of  purpose  by  no  means  common.  I 
soon  realized  that  in  his  own  experience  he  had 
confronted  and  solved  practically  every  problem 
which  we  were  investigating,  and  which  might 
confront  the  poor  boy  looking  forward  to  a  uni- 
versity education. 

As  truth  is  stranger  than  fiction  and  more  in- 
teresting than  statistics,  I  was  convinced  that 
his  own  story  would  be  far  more  significant  and 
of  greater  value  than  any  articles  of  mine  might 
ever  hope  to  be,  and  I  repeatedly  urged  him  to 
write  it.  This  his  modesty  refused  to  allow  him 
to  do.  He  offered  no  objection,  however,  to  my 
making  use  of  the  material  he  had  placed  in  my 
hands,  in  case  it  was  felt  that  it  would  be  of  value 
and  interest  to  others. 


PREFACE  xi 

As  a  result  of  our  series  of  friendly  and  informal 
conferences  and  a  goodly  amount  of  questioning, 
he  had  now  given  me,  at  one  time  and  another,  a 
fairly  complete  account  of  his  life  in  college,  with 
sudden  and  illuminating  glimpses  of  the  world 
from  which  he  had  come.  Before  proceeding 
with  the  original  plans  I  prepared  for  my  own 
guidance  a  connected  account,  in  his  own  words, 
of  his  story  as  he  had  given  it  to  me.  I  was  more 
than  ever  convinced  that  this  story  would  be  a 
greater  help  and  a  safer  guide  to  young  men 
than  any  mere  record  of  the  difficulties  to  be  met 
and  the  possible  methods  of  meeting  them.  At 
my  very  earnest  request  he  therefore  gave  his 
consent  to  allow  it  to  be  placed  before  the  gradu- 
ates of  his  university  and  it  was  published  in  in- 
stalments in  the  Princeton  Alumni  Weekly. 

Its  appearance  there  has  aroused  much  favor- 
able comment  and  discussion.  Apart  from  the 
information  conveyed  to  the  young  man  strug- 
gling against  difficulties  for  admission  to  the  uni- 
versity world,  and  apart  from  its  value  as  a  human 
document,  it  gave  so  new  and  significant  an 
answer  to  the  question  so  frequently  put:  "What 


xii  PREFACE 

is  a  college  education  worth?"  and  "What  does 
it  cost?"  that  numerous  requests  have  been  re- 
ceived for  its  publication  in  permanent  form. 
To  these  requests  from  many  unknown  friends 
the  original  narrator  has  now  generously  acceded, 
and  the  story  in  its  present  form  is  printed  with 
his  permission  and  sanction.  For  the  informal 
manner  of  presentation,  the  frequent  use  of  slang, 
and  the  generally  familiar  style  no  further  ex- 
planation or  excuse  is  therefore  offered,  and  it 
is,  of  course,  understood  that  the  expressions 
employed  and  the  opinions  offered  are  his  and 
not  mine. 

Although  it  may  convey  to  the  reader  the  im- 
pression that  he  is  overhearing  a  private  conversa- 
tion, I  did  not  feel  free  to  depart  from  the  familiar 
colloquial  tone  employed  by  the  original  narrator. 
As  eavesdroppers  are  the  best  listeners  and  as  sto- 
ries, especially  true  stories  of  real  life  thus  over- 
heard, have  the  added  savor  of  stolen  sweets,  this 
will,  we  believe,  work  no  hardship  to  the  public. 
Sensitive  readers  are,  however,  reassured  that  they 
are  now  invited  and  accredited  eavesdroppers, 
and  the  present  writer  hopes  that  the  story  here 


PREFACE  xiii 

frankly  and  faithfully  recounted  will  afford  them 
the  same  pleasure  and  satisfaction  which  he  him- 
self experienced  when  in  the  same  words  and  style 
it  was  first  told  him  by  his  younger  friend. 

Christian  Gauss. 

Princeton,  N.  J.,  June,  1915. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PACE 

I.  From  Street  Gamin  to  Freshman  ...  i 

II.  Learning  How  to  be  a  Freshman      .    .  21 

III.  Fighting  Against  Odds 39 

IV.  Devil  and  Deep  Sea 61 

V.  The  Gay  Young  Sophomore 80 

VI.  On  the  Defensive 96 

VII.  With  Compliments  to  Paddy     ....  108 

VIII.  Undergraduate  Big  Business    .    .    .    .  117 

IX.  Don't  Be  a  Turtle 136 

X.  A  Senior  at  Last 150 


Through  College  on 
Nothing  a  Year 

CHAPTER  I 
FROM  STREET  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN 

The  Finest  Four  Years  of  His  Lite 

You'd  like  to  know  what  it  feels  like  to  go 
through  college  on  nothing  a  year  from  home? 
It  will  be  pretty  hard  to  make  any  one  under- 
stand who  hasn't  done  it,  and  I'll  have  to  tell 
you  a  good  many  things  that  I  don't  care  to 
make  public.  But  if  you  mean,  "is  it  a  hard 
thing  to  do?"  or,  "Am  I  sorry  that  I  did  it?"  I 
can  say  right  off  the  bat:  "A  thousand  times  no." 
So  I  want  to  tell  you  at  the  start,  and  I  want  to 
make  it  emphatic,  that  if  at  any  time  you  get  the 
idea  that  I  have  had  a  poor  time  in  college,  you 
get  a  false  impression.  In  this  little  town  and  on 
this  campus  I  have  had  the  finest  four  years  of 
my  life,  and  I  would  not  trade  it  for  anything 


si-..    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

that  ever  came  before,  or,  so  far  as  I  can  see,  for 
any  four  years  that  will  ever  come  after. 

How  did  I  ever  get  the  notion  of  coming  to 
college?  Well,  that's  pretty  hard  to  say.  There 
was  a  time  in  my  life  when  I  didn't  know  that 
such  a  thing  as  a  college  existed.  I  first  learned 
that  there  were  colleges  from  the  sporting  pages 
of  the  newspapers,  and  there  were  three  of  them 
that  I  heard  about  particularly,  Yale  and  Har- 
vard and  Princeton,  not  because  they  were  the 
best  universities,  necessarily,  but  because  their 
athletic  teams  received  most  space  in  the  sport- 
ing columns  that  came  under  my  eye.  You 
must  remember  that  for  the  most  part  we  self- 
helpers  are  not  the  sons  of  alumni,  and  very 
often,  in  the  world  that  we  come  from,  there  is 
no  college  man.  That  was  my  case.  I  was  born 
and  raised  (if  you  can  say  that  I  was  raised)  in 
a  somewhat  disreputable  Jersey  suburb  of  New 
York,  famous  for  its  goats  and  slums.  I  came 
from  the  slums.  I  have  just  now  come  back 
from  a  slumming  trip  of  the  social-economics 
class.  That  trip  didn't  teach  me  anything.  It 
was  a  dead  loss. 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN        3 

A  New  Heaven  and  a  New  Earth 

The  East  Side  slums  that  we  visited  are  not 
one,  two,  three  with  the  slums  in  which  I  was 
brought  up.  I'd  like  to  tell  you  a  little  about 
this,  because  one  of  the  difficulties  you  men  have 
in  understanding  us  lies  in  the  fact  that  you 
can't  even  imagine  what  the  world  looks  like 
to  us  before  we  get  here,  and  how  different  it 
looks  to  us  when  we  leave.  Four  years  here 
literally  give  us  a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth. 
That  one  change  is  worth  all  my  college  career 
cost  me.  And,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  it  didn't  cost 
me  anything,  because  I  should  have  had  to  earn 
my  own  way  even  if  I  had  never  come  to  Prince- 
ton. My  education  has  been  handed  me  on  a 
gold  platter. 

Yes,  I  was  arrested  twice.  Each  "prison  term" 
was  a  one-night  stand.  It  was  during  a  very 
bad  winter,  and  for  three  weeks  we  lived  literally 
on  bread  and  water,  and  occasionally  that  diet 
had  to  be  simplified  for  a  day  or  two.  The  com- 
bination of  freezing  and  starving,  and  general 
low  spirits  while  the  father  is  going  around  look- 


4       COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

ing  for  a  job,  tends  to  make  you  forget  the  some- 
what artificial  distinction  between  meum  and 
tuum.  Why  should  we  not  be  warm  when 
others  were  and  when  down  in  the  yards  firemen, 
out  of  overflowing  fire-boxes,  were  raking  the  red- 
hot  coals,  and  when  trains  went  through  carry- 
ing cars  so  full  that  they  overflowed  with  what 
would  never  be  used?  As  children  we  used  to 
pick  up  the  loose  bits  or  follow  at  a  discreet  dis- 
tance when  they  raked  out  the  fires,  put  out  the 
glow  with  snow  or  water,  wait  for  it  to  cool,  and 
bring  home  the  half-burnt  lumps  of  coke. 

My  older  brother  and  I  were  down  along  the 
tracks,  and  I  was  trudging  along  with  what  for 
me  was  a  pretty  heavy  bag  of  half-burnt  coal. 
The  railroad  detective  came  up  from  behind. 
We  were  afraid  of  him  because  he  had  killed  his 
man.  My  brother  noticed  him  and  called  to 
me  to  run;  and  we  both  dropped  our  bags  and 
made  off.  I  was  a  little  fellow  and  it  may  be 
that  I  wouldn't  have  beaten  him.  But  that 
race  was  not  to  be  to  the  swift.  He  pulled  his 
gun  on  us  and  yelled:  "Stop,  or  I'll  shoot."  I 
stopped.     My  brother   ran.     The   second   shot 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN         5 

hit  his  shoe  and  carried  off  his  heel.  He  looked 
back,  and,  seeing  that  I  was  arrested,  came  back 
to  keep  me  company.  We  were  marched  off. 
There  was  a  queer  mixture  of  brutality  and 
solemnity  about  that  trip  to  the  office  of  the 
justice  of  the  peace.  Now  and  then  the  detect- 
ive helped  me  to  make  haste  with  his  foot.  He 
was  trying  to  impress  and  frighten  me,  and  all 
that  I  remember  about  that  trip  is  kicks  and 
" petty  larceny" — words  which  my  captor  ut- 
tered very  frequently  and  with  an  air  of  great 
importance.  I  took  it  that  petty  larceny  must 
be  some  particularly  expensive  kind  of  coal. 

Now,  to  me  this  arrest  wasn't  complete.  I 
wasn't  handcuffed.  I  had  previously  believed 
that  this  was  a  regular  part  of  the  ceremony, 
and  thought  I  was  being  discriminated  against 
because  I  was  a  little  fellow.  Instead,  the  de- 
tective made  us  walk  ahead  and  he  came  along 
behind,  gun  in  hand.  The  justice  of  the  peace, 
who  I  believe  gets  a  certain  amount  for  each  case, 
had  us  locked  up  for  the  night  in  an  old  wooden 
station,  where  we  took  turns  in  trying  to  sleep 
on  a  splintered  wooden  bench. 


6       COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

Oh,  the  other  arrest  wasn't  much.  It  was 
merely  for  playing  hookey.  But  it  will  help  to 
make  my  point  and  give  you  my  standpoint  at 
that  time  if  I  tell  you  that  my  all-too-brief  prison 
experiences  were  to  me  a  kind  of  holiday  and 
pleasant  surprise.  I  had  always  been  told  that 
in  prison  men  were  fed  on  mouldy  bread-crusts 
and  water.  You  can  imagine  my  pleasure  when, 
after  having  spent  the  night  in  a  relatively  warm 
room,  they  brought  me  in  the  morning  a  very 
huge-looking  piece  of  bread  and  a  cup  of  sweet 
coffee.  Yes,  "sweet  coffee"  was  what  we  called 
coffee  with  sugar  in  it,  for  ours  usually  had 
none.  In  the  afternoon  after  my  nearly  regular 
arrest  I  was  out  along  the  tracks  again.  These 
things,  therefore,  are  a  part  of  my  background 
if  you  wish  to  see  it  as  I  saw  it. 

Furthermore,  it  wasn't  a  hardship  to  work;  I 
was  used  to  that  because  I  have  done  it  since  I 
was  a  child.  At  nine  I  drove  a  butcher's  cart 
on  a  route  with  thirty-five  customers.  That  was 
hard  work  because  I  wanted  to  be  in  the  back 
lot  playing  baseball,  and  occasionally  I  handed 
some   good  woman   some   other  good  woman's 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN         7 

sausage,  which  didn't  bring  me  many  kind  words 
from  the  boss.  When  I  was  ten  I  worked  in  a 
cemetery  all  my  spare  time  during  the  spring  and 
summer  and  fall.  I  planted  flowers  on  the  graves, 
two  plants  for  five  cents;  and  watered  the  lit- 
tle garden  plots  around  the  monuments,  twelve 
quarts  for  a  nickel;  and  cut  the  grass  around 
and  upon  the  graves,  fifteen  cents  a  grave.  Why 
do  I  remember  those  prices?  Because  they  were 
the  most  important  thing  in  my  world. 

Now,  of  course  this  wasn't  exciting  for  a  boy 
and  the  environment  wasn't  cheerful.  I  tell  it 
to  you  only  that  you  will  understand  what  the 
economists  would  call  the  state  of  the  money 
market  in  my  town  when  I  was  a  boy.  Cash 
wasn't  easy. 

A  little  later  I  worked  on  a  huckster's  wagon 
at  twenty-five  cents  a  day,  and  I  tell  you  they 
were  long  days.  Nothing  makes  a  day  seem  so 
long  as  work  that  you  don't  like.  One  day  the 
boss,  a  big,  burly  chap  who  was  angry  because 
business  had  been  poor,  struck  me  a  terrific 
blow  in  the  kidney  and  I  dropped  into  the  wagon. 
As  we  were  passing  a  farmhouse  I    evidently 


8       COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

came  to  and  groaned  in  the  cart,  for  an  old 
farmer  came  out  and  remonstrated.  The  boss 
excused  himself,  laid  it  to  my  misdeeds,  and 
drove  on  out  of  sight.  Then  he  accused  me  of 
having  played  the  baby  act,  swore  some,  knocked 
me  insensible  again,  and  left  me  in  the  road. 
He  still  owes  me  two  days'  pay.  Now,  you  must 
remember  that  we  make  our  money  a  good  deal 
easier  than  that  when  we  get  to  college,  but  we 
need  more  money  than  I  did  then.  But  I  merely 
want  to  let  you  know  why  a  dollar  looks  as  big 
as  your  head  to  us  before  we  get  here. 

But  how  did  I  get  the  notion  of  coming  to 
college?  Well,  I'm  coming  to  that.  You  must 
let  me  tell  my  story  in  my  own  way.  I  suppose 
as  a  little  chap  I  went  to  school  because  it  was 
pleasanter  at  school  than  it  was  to  stay  around 
in  my  neighborhood,  and  my  mother  was  off 
working  most  of  the  time.  I  liked  it  at  school; 
it  was  a  kind  of  holiday  and  I  hated  the  idea 
of  leaving  it. 

So  I  went  on  into  the  high  school  after  a 
stormy  family  council  in  which  I  agreed  to  pay 
my  expenses  and  my  board  at  home.    Incident- 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN         9 

ally,  I  couldn't  quite  swing  that  proposition,  and 
there  were  arrearages  before  I  got  through.  That's 
why  I  came  down  to  college  with  so  little  ready 
cash.  In  the  high  school  I  began  to  hear  and 
think  more  about  colleges,  though  without  any 
intention  of  ever  going  there.  I  imagined  that 
every  man  in  college  was  a  big  athlete.  I  had  a 
notion  they  were  all  great,  strong  fellows,  all 
over  six  feet  tall,  because  the  only  pictures  of 
college  men  I  had  seen  were  pictures  of  athletes. 
Then  as  I  went  along  in  the  school  I  found  that 
one  or  two  of  the  teachers  there  were  college  men; 
one  of  them  was  a  Princeton  man.  I  happened 
to  be  making  a  good  record  and  he  began  to  talk 
college  to  me.  That  was  the  beginning.  The 
idea  grew  on  me,  and  it  had  the  fascination  of 
something  far  off.  About  the  same  time  some- 
body told  me  about  an  Indian  who  had  gone 
through  Princeton  on  seventy-five  dollars  a  year 
and  a  blanket  given  him  by  the  government. 
That  didn't  sound  so  bad.  By  the  way,  did  you 
ever  hear  about  that  redskin?  He  sure  was  a 
good  Indian.  I  looked  him  up  after  I  got  here, 
for  I  had  come  to  look  upon  him  as  a  kindred 


io     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

spirit,  but  discovered  that,  like  other  good  In- 
dians, he  was  a  myth.  The  good  as  well  as  the 
evil  that  men  do  seems  to  live  after  them,  even 
if  they  never  did  it  at  all,  and  he  was  partly 
responsible  for  my  coming  here  just  the  same.  I 
finally  got  the  "hot  dope"  as  to  what  I  would 
really  be  up  against  from  a  young  Princeton 
graduate,  a  very  fine  fellow.  I  made  up  my 
mind  I  was  going  to  do  what  the  Indian  had 
done.    So  much  for  that  for  the  present. 

I  spoke  of  how  large  the  dollar  looks  to  us 
when  we  first  come  to  college.  The  university 
doesn't  understand  that  and  it  can't  be  expected 
that  it  should.  No  university  does.  You  question 
that?  Well,  let  me  try  to  make  my  point.  And 
at  the  same  time  I  shall  be  getting  into  my  story. 

When  I  came  to  Princeton  in  the  fall  I  came 
with  three  dollars  in  my  pocket.  To  me  that 
was  a  lot  of  money,  because  it  was  all  I  had. 
That  is,  three  dollars  over  my  railroad  fare  here 
and  back;  and  let  me  call  to  your  attention  also 
that  this  ride  to  Princeton,  even  if  it  was  only 
fifty  miles,  was  to  me  what  a  trip  to  California 
would  be  to  some  of  the  other  fellows.    It  was 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN       n 

the  longest  ride  I  had  ever  taken,  because  I  had 
only  been  in  a  train  twice  before,  both  times  for 
very  "short  rides,  I  mean  five  or  ten  miles;  and 
a  ride  on  the  New  York  elevated  was  to  me  an 
excursion.  That  trip  to  Princeton  was  an  ex- 
perience. I  had  heard  about  the  beautiful  sce- 
nery that  you  see  from  the  trains.  I  thought 
this  must  be  some  of  it  and  enjoyed  it  immensely. 
I  thought  the  strip  of  woods  that  we  came  through 
as  we  drew  near  Princeton  on  that  September 
day  was  the  most  beautiful  scenery  I  had  ever 
seen,  and  Princeton  itself  and  the  buildings 
were  like  a  city  in  a  dream.  I  came  down  with 
another  chap  who  was  taking  his  preliminary 
examinations,  and  was  told  that  we  could  get  a 
"cheap"  room  on  Chambers  Street  with  a  Mrs. 
X.  We  made  for  Chambers  Street.  I  was  busi- 
ness manager  of  our  partnership  and  I  asked 
about  the  rooms.  She  showed  us  a  very  small 
room  with  one  bed  for  both  of  us,  and  she  wanted 
three  dollars  for  the  two  nights.  You  think 
that's  cheap?  It  wasn't  cheap  for  me.  When  I 
was  on  the  huckster's  wagon  room-rent  didn't 
cost  me  anything,  because  I  didn't  have  any  room. 


12     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  slept  in  a  hay-loft.  They  used  to  allow  me 
fifteen  cents  for  supper  and  breakfast.  So  I 
shook  the  dust  of  Chambers  Street  from  my 
feet.  I  honestly  thought  the  woman  was  trying 
to  "do"  me. 

A  Lodging  for  the  Night 

The  first  night  after  our  examinations  the 
other  fellow  and  myself  bought  a  couple  of  news- 
papers and  walked,  or  rather  stumbled,  along  the 
railroad  tracks  to  that  little  six-by-eight  waiting- 
room  where  the  railroad  crosses  the  turnpike  at 
Penn's  Neck.  It  was  pitch-dark  and  was  rain- 
ing hard.  Of  course  I  had  my  best  clothes  on  and 
so  took  off  my  coat  because  I  didn't  want  to 
get  it  wrinkled,  spread  out  the  papers,  and  lay 
down  on  the  bench  in  the  Penn's  Neck  station 
and  tried  to  sleep.  But  one  of  the  window-panes 
was  broken  and  the  rain  came  driving  in.  I 
took  a  newspaper  and  tried  to  shut  out  the 
storm,  but  it  was  dark,  and  we  had  no  matches, 
and  couldn't  make  it  stay.  We  stuffed  loose 
paper  into  the  broken  pane,  but  it  got  soft  and 
melted  and  the  rain  came  splashing  in  on  us  all 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN       13 

night  long.  Still  it  would  have  been  all  right, 
but  every  train  that  came  in  from  the  junction 
stopped  in  front  of  the  station  because  they  saw 
us  lying  on  the  benches  and  thought  we  were 
prospective  passengers.  So  if  my  rest  was  broken 
it  wasn't  only  because  the  bench  was  hard.  I 
was  used  to  that. 

Now,  the  next  day  I  was  busy  morning  and 
afternoon,  and  the  other  fellow  had  some  hours 
off,  so  I  sent  him  out  scouting,  and  the  second 
night  (it  was  still  raining)  we  walked  down  what 
I  have  since  learned  to  be  Alexander  Street, 
and  down  there  in  the  Basin  somewhere  we  found 
a  ramshackle  deserted  house,  spread  our  papers 
on  the  floor,  and  tried  to  sleep.  A  man  with  a 
lantern  approached,  and  we  thought  we  would 
either  be  arrested  or  have  to  fight  for  it.  But 
the  danger  passed  and  "Moscow's  walls  were 
safe  again.' ' 

We  finished  our  exams  the  next  morning  and 
I  decided  to  celebrate.  We  bought  two  loaves 
of  bread  and  a  pound  of  bologna  sausage,  went 
over  behind  the  cemetery  on  Witherspoon  Street, 
and  had  a  grand  feast. 


i4     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

Apparent  Failure 

Things  were  going  fine,  but  when  the  results 
of  the  examinations  came  out  my  name,  unlike 
Abou  Ben  Adhem's,  didn't  head  the  list  of  the 
admitted  candidates  posted  in  the  west  end  of 
McCosh.  It  was  not  on  the  list  at  all,  and  I 
thought  it  was  all  up.  But  I  saw  some  notice 
about  an  entrance  committee  and  asked  what  it 
meant.  I  realized  that  I  had  some  chance  to 
make  a  bicker  and  I'll  tell  you  I  was  dead  in 
earnest  about  getting  into  Princeton.  So  I  de- 
cided I'd  go  up  and  talk  to  the  profs.  I  went 
over  to  where  the  committee  on  examinations 
was  sitting.  There  was  a  big  crowd  of  disap- 
pointed candidates  like  myself  waiting,  and  I 
noticed  that  they  were  calling  them  up  one  by 
one.  You  can't  imagine  what  "a  professor" 
meant  to  me.  In  those  days  to  me  he  was  not 
only  a  rare  bird,  he  was  a  kind  of  demigod.  In 
all  my  life  I  had  only  seen  one  college  professor 
on  the  hoof.  That  one  came  to  our  high  school 
to  give  an  elocution  recital  when  I  was  a  junior. 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN       15 

The  Council  of  the  Gods 

Well,  here  I  was  in  a  room  full  of  Princeton 
professors!  They  were  sitting  around  a  table 
and  it  looked  to  me  like  the  council  of  the  gods 
on  Mount  Olympus. 

Now,  the  man  who  knows  the  life  of  the  streets 
can  tell  more  about  human  psychology  than  the 
other  fellows.  Any  newsboy  in  New  York  can 
size  up  a  man  far  better  than  the  average  senior 
in  college.  He  knows  what  the  chances  are  of 
getting  a  nickel  from  this  fellow  or  that  fellow 
before  he  asks,  and  if  he  is  thrown  down  it  isn't 
because  he  doesn't  often  expect  to  be  thrown 
down,  but  because  he  is  willing  to  take  the  long 
chance. 

Now,  the  students  who  had  flunked  their  ex- 
aminations were  going  up  in  order,  the  "A's  "  first. 
I  scanned  the  faces  as  each  one  came  out,  and  I 
could  tell  whether  he  had  been  turned  down 
cold  or  whether  he  had  been  given  some  hope, 
and  it  was  plain  to  me  that  only  a  few  of  those 
fellows  then  coming  out  were  being  admitted  on 
trial.    So  I  thought  I  had  a  poor  chance.    But 


16     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

things  were  moving  very  slowly.  After  a  couple 
of  hours  they  were  only  up  to  the  "E's,"  and  I 
saw  that  at  that  rate  my  turn  at  the  end  of  the 
alphabet  wouldn't  come  up  till  the  next  day. 

I  began  to  be  afraid  I'd  have  to  buy  another 
bologna  and  stay  another  night.  It  seems  funny 
to  you?  That's  my  point  exactly;  the  university 
can't  understand  that  it  is  a  pretty  serious  busi- 
ness to  the  fellow  who  comes  with  a  couple  of 
dollars.  I  was  desperate,  and  decided  that  I  had 
to  put  my  case  very  soon.  They  were  calling 
for  E's.  I  went  up  and  said  my  name  didn't 
begin  with  "E,"  but  I  told  them  I  didn't  have 
money  enough  to  stay  over  in  Princeton  another 
night  and  asked  them  if  they  wouldn't  consider 
my  case  then.  They  were  very  nice  about  that 
and  said  they  would.  So  I  began  to  give  them 
the  straight  dope.  I  couldn't  understand  why  I 
had  failed  because  I  had  been  valedictorian  of 
my  class.  How  should  I  know  that  the  school 
was  not  up  to  the  standard  ?  In  competing  with 
fellows  from  other  high  schools,  I  subsequently 
learned  that  it  was  not,  but,  even  so,  I  won't 
blame  it  all  on  the  school. 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN       17 

Now,  I  have  tried  to  let  you  know  that  my 
coming  to  Princeton  to  pass  the  examinations 
was  to  me  no  small  matter.  I  had  worked  hard 
to  get  down  here,  had  been  soaking  wet  for  two 
days,  hadn't  had  much  sleep,  and  I  was  a  nervous 
wreck,  but  didn't  know  it,  because  I  didn't  know 
what  that  was.  Where  I  came  from  nobody 
knew  that  he  was  a  nervous  wreck.  If  that's 
what  he  was,  he  thought  he  had  something 
else. 

The  committee  explained  to  me  that  I  hadn't 
passed  a  sufficient  number  of  examinations  to  be 
admitted,  even  on  probation.  They  were  sorry. 
Now,  can  you  imagine  what  it  would  have  been 
like  for  me  to  have  to  go  back  to  my  home  and 
say  that  I  couldn't  get  in?  So  I  put  my  case 
before  them  just  as  plainly  as  I  could.  I  put  it 
this  way:  Gentlemen,  why  don't  you  give  me  a 
chance  ?  If  I  don't  make  good  by  Thanksgiving, 
it  won't  hurt  the  university;  if  I  do  make  good, 
it  will  help  me. 

One  of  the  professors  spoke  up.  I  don't  know 
who  he  was,  but  he  was  a  fine  chap.  "I  am  very 
sorry,  Mr.  X,  that  we  can't  make  any  excep- 


u8     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

tions.  We  ourselves  are  governed  by  certain 
definite  rules  from  which  we  cannot  deviate. 
However,  we  shall  take  up  your  case  at  a  special 
meeting  of  the  committee  and  let  you  know  by 
telegraph."  To  me  it  was  a  very  nice  way  of 
saying  "So  long."  But  I  took  the  train  and 
went  home,  and,  thinking  it  was  all  up,  I  an- 
swered thirty  "ads"  in  the  New  York  Herald 
that  night  and  the  next  morning,  "ads"  for  jobs 
of  all  kinds. 

The  Telegram  "Collect" 

A  couple  of  days  later  I  got  a  telegram  col- 
lect. It  ran:  "Entrance  committee  have  de- 
cided to  admit  you  on  trial.  Report  Monday." 
I  still  have  that  telegram,  and  know  it  came  col- 
lect, because  I  had  to  borrow  forty-five  cents  to 
pay  for  it. 

Well,  say !  You  don't  know  what  that  meant 
to  me.  You  could  have  knocked  me  down  with 
a  feather !  So  I  was  in !  I  packed  my  hand-bag. 
It  was  a  black  cardboard  hand-bag,  three  years 
old,  originally  costing  ninety-eight  cents.  At 
that  time  it  was  split  at  the  edges  and  was  held 


FROM  GAMIN  TO  FRESHMAN       19 

together  by  a  ten-cent  book-strap.  I  threw  into 
it  a  shirt,  a  suit  of  underwear,  a  comb,  a  pair  of 
socks,  a  looking-glass,  and  shaving  apparatus. 
I  had  only  the  one  suit,  which  I  was  then  wear- 
ing. My  new  two-dollar-and-fif ty-cent  trunk  was 
to  follow  me  down  with  the  rest  of  my  effects, 
and  fittings  for  my  room  as  soon  as  I  had  es- 
tablished an  address. 

I  thought  a  great  university,  like  any  other  in- 
stitution, opened  for  business  at  eight  o'clock,  so 
I  took  the  six-o'clock  train  from  the  Penn  Sta- 
tion, and  arrived  in  Princeton  at  seven  forty-five. 
I  waited  till  eight  o'clock  and  walked  over  to  the 
university  offices  and  tried  the  door.  It  was 
locked.  I  sat  down  on  a  bench  under  the  trees 
at  the  west  end  of  Nassau  Hall.  I  must  have 
been  a  queer  sight  on  the  front  campus  with  my 
strapped  cardboard  grip,  my  cuffed  trousers  and 
colored  cap.  College  had  opened  on  the  previous 
Thursday  and  all  freshmen  were  now  in  regular 
freshman  garb.  Any  one  else  would  have  known 
that  it  was  anathema  for  a  freshman  to  wear 
cuffed  trousers  and  a  colored  cap,  but  about  such 
college  taboos  I,  of  course,  knew  nothing. 


20     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

But  I  didn't  think  of  my  looks.  I  was  a  fresh- 
man in  Princeton. 

Do  you  remember  in  the  play,  when  Monte 
Cristo  is  taken  for  dead  and  thrown  off  the  cliff 
in  the  bag,  how  he  cuts  himself  out  of  the  bag, 
swims  over  to  the  island,  climbs  up  on  land,  and 
shouts:  "The  world  is  mine !" 

Well,  after  I  got  here  from  my  one-horse  town 
with  my  little  satchel  and  found  myself  sitting 
on  the  front  campus,  which  now  belonged  partly 
to  me,  I  felt  like  the  Count  of  Monte  Cristo. 
A  new  world  was  mine.  I  felt  as  if  I  owned  Nas- 
sau Hall.  It  was  pretty  fine,  too  fine  to  last. 
Pretty  soon  I  began  to  feel  worried.  What 
would  it  be  like,  and  where  was  I  going  to  sleep 
that  night? 


CHAPTER  II 

LEARNING  HOW  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN 

First  Impressions 

It  was  some  proud  moment.  The  worry  didn't 
last  long,  though  it  had  a  way  of  coming  back 
many  times  before  I  was  finally  settled.  I  was 
sitting  on  the  front  campus,  and  it  was  a  won- 
derful day,  beautiful — one  of  those  fine  late  sum- 
mer days  that  are  going  to  turn  out  real  hot.  I 
had  gone  to  the  offices  and  learned,  to  my  sur- 
prise, that  they  were  not  to  be  open  till  nine 
o'clock,  so  I  had  an  hour  before  me  and  lots  to 
look  at  and  think  about. 

What  did  I  think  of  the  students?  Well,  at 
first  I  was  disappointed,  to  tell  the  truth.  And, 
to  be  perfectly  honest  with  you,  the  joke  was 
on  me.  After  what  had  happened  I  was  just  a 
little  bit  proud  to  be  in,  and  before  I  got  here 
I  thought  I  would  be  a  novelty  to  these  boys, 
that  they  would  pay  me  some  attention,  for  I'm 


22     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

not  a  very  big  fellow  and  I  had  expected  to  find 
them  big,  athletic  six-footers.  Some  of  them 
were  only  my  size,  and  all  of  them  left  me  to 
myself.  That  hurt  my  pride.  I  watched  them 
sauntering  up  the  walk,  most  of  them  in  their 
white  flannels,  and  saw  them  come  up  to  each 
other,  through  the  shadows  of  the  old  trees, 
and  shake  hands.  They  were  laughing  and  very 
friendly.  I  couldn't  hear  what  they  said,  but 
they  did  it  so  often  that  to  me  it  seemed  artificial. 
Pretty  soon  two  of  them  met  just  a  little  in  front 
of  me  and  I  heard  their  conversation. 

"Mighty  glad  to  see  you.  Where  have  you 
been?    Have  you  had  a  pleasant  summer ?" 

And  then  "Excuse  me,"  and  he  turned  around 
to  some  other  fellows  and  went  through  the 
same  rigmarole.  Now,  when  you  meet  a  fellow 
in  the  city  you  grasp  his  hand  down  low.  This 
fellow  held  it  a  little  high.  And  the  hand-shake 
struck  me  as  dainty.  Now,  that  particular  chap 
was  just  a  little  effeminate,  but  to  me  every  stu- 
dent was  as  yet  typical,  and  as  I  sat  there  I  saw 
man  after  man  stop  and  shake  hands  with  the 
fellows  passing.    The  spirit  was  much  friendlier 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    23 

than  what  I  had  been  used  to,  but  I  must  confess 
it  struck  me  as  affected.  I  found  that,  after  a 
year  or  two,  coming  back  to  college,  I  was  doing 
the  same  thing  myself. 

Press  Your  Clothes— Twelve  Dollars  a 
Year 

But,  after  all,  the  boys  passing  by  as  I  sat 
alone  on  my  bench  made  me  feel  just  a  little  out 
of  it,  and  then  I  saw  a  chap  not  quite  so  well 
dressed  as  the  others  (this,  of  course,  struck  me) 
circulate  through  the  crowd,  go  up  to  one  man 
after  another  and  talk  to  him,  and  finally  bring 
out  a  note-book  and  write  something  in  it  and 
move  on.  What  could  this  mean?  He  came  to 
where  I  sat  and  stood  in  front  of  me.  Well, 
would  you  believe  it?  That  fellow  had  the  nerve 
to  ask  me  if  I  wouldn't  sign  up  for  the  Students' 
Pressing  Establishment !  It  was  only  six  dollars 
a  term,  twelve  dollars  a  year.  He  must  have 
been  anxious  for  business,  and  if  I  hadn't  seen  him 
sign  up  the  other  fellows  I  would  have  thought 
that  he  was  making  fun  of  me.  But  as  he'd 
been  nice  I  thought  I'd  be  nice,  too.    So  I  told 


24     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

him  I'd  always  pressed  my  own  clothes  before 
and  expected  to  keep  on  doing  it.  Why  did  he 
ask  me?  Oh,  I  was  pretty  well  togged  out  and 
he  could  see  by  the  green  in  my  eyes  that  I  was 
a  freshman,  and  I  have  learned  since  that  every 
man  with  a  business  scheme  like  this  lies  in  wait 
for  the  freshman. 

Altogether,  it  was  a  very  full  and  interesting 
hour.  Now  and  then  thoughts  of  my  room 
swam  into  my  head,  but  these  thoughts  were 
casual  and  just  flitted  through  my  mind.  Oc- 
casionally I  thought  about  what  would  happen 
when  I  registered.  Pretty  soon  the  bell  struck 
nine.  I  started.  I  got  up  and  asked  a  student 
where  to  register.  He  pointed  out  the  door. 
It  was  in  the  University  Offices  building,  since 
named  Stanhope  Hall.  Was  I  frightened?  No, 
not  at  all.  I  was  used  to  asking  for  what  I  wanted. 
I  walked  into  the  offices  as  I'd  walk  in  to  ask  for 
a  job.  I  told  the  man  at  the  desk  my  name,  and 
he  pulled  out  an  ordinary  class  schedule  and 
asked  me  what  courses  I  was  going  to  take.  In 
my  high  school  there  hadn't  been  any  electives. 
There  was   the   academic   and   the   commercial 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    25 

course.  I  didn't  know  what  an  elective  was. 
So,  when  he  asked  me  what  courses  I'd  take,  I 
told  him  I  thought  I'd  take  the  regular  course. 
Now,  what  you  take  as  a  freshman  depends,  of 
course,  upon  what  you  offer  for  entrance.  But 
I  had  been  so  busy  trying  to  get  in,  and  inci- 
dentally had  been  so  completely  misinformed  by 
people  who  knew  nothing  about  Princeton,  that 
I  had  given  this  no  thought.  So  he  asked  me 
a  few  questions,  underlined  certain  sections  of 
the  schedule  with  a  pencil,  and,  when  he  had 
planned  my  work,  handed  it  to  me. 

That  Complicated  Schedule 

Did  you  ever  see  those  cartoons  by  Goldberg 
in  The  Mail,  "What  are  you  going  to  do  with  it, 
now  you've  got  it?"  And  the  answer  is:  "Search 
me !"  That  was  the  situation.  I  had  my  sched- 
ule, but  I  didn't  know  what  to  do  with  it  or 
what  it  meant,  so  I  put  it  in  my  pocket  and 
walked  away.  Then  I  went  up  to  a  man,  "H," 
who  was  passing.  Now,  "H"  was  the  first  hard- 
looking  specimen  that  I  had  met  in  this  place, 
and  he  was  a  sophomore.     I  was,  of  course,  a 


26     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

freshman,  but  didn't  know  as  yet  that  I  was  sup- 
posed to  quake  before  him.  If  I  had  known  it, 
I  would  have  done  it.  But  I  didn't  know.  So 
I  showed  him  the  paper  and  asked  him  what 
"D,"  "M,"  and  "P"  meant.  This,  of  course, 
gave  me  away  and  advertised  the  fact  that  I  was 
a  freshman.  But  he  gave  me  no  trouble,  told 
me  that  "D"  meant  Dickinson  Hall,  and  even 
pointed  out  the  direction  and  explained  how  to 
get  there. 

I  wanted  to  think  it  over.  I  was  anxious  to 
go  to  class,  but  there  were  many  things  on  my 
mind.  What  was  I  going  to  do  for  a  room? 
Then,  too,  I  had  left  home,  as  you  will  remember, 
at  six — that  is,  without  breakfast.  And  while  I 
was  sitting  there  on  the  front  campus  I  was  too 
much  interested  to  think  about  it.  But  I  thought 
about  it  now  and  decided  I'd  do  without  and  save 
the  money.  That  settled  one  point.  But  the 
room  question  was  on  my  mind.  So,  on  the 
principle  "business  before  pleasure,"  I  decided 
that  I'd  have  to  settle  that  too.  Have  you  ever 
been  away  where  you  don't  know  a  soul  and 
where  you  know  you  have  to  stay  for  some  time  ? 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    27 

I  was  beginning  to  feel  like  that  and  walked  up 
and  down  trying  to  decide. 

Then  a  curious  thing  happened,  and  a  mighty 
nice  one.  As  I  turned  around  a  fellow  (we'll 
call  him  "L")  came  up  to  me  with  a  very  pleas- 
ant smile  and  "Hello,  XI"  He  was  the  only 
man  in  Princeton  that  I  knew.  I  say  "knew," 
though  I  had  seen  him  only  twice  before  in  my 
life.  He  came  from  the  town  next  mine.  I 
think  now  that  he  must  have  known  that  I  was 
in  a  pickle,  and  he  had  too  much  of  the  milk  of 
human  kindness  in  him  to  turn  even  a  dog  away. 
He  asked  me:  "Where  are  you  staying?"  I 
said:  "I  don't  know;  I  was  just  going  to  look  for 
a  room."  He  took  my  satchel,  gave  me  his  ad- 
dress, and  passed  on.  I  wanted  to  get  settled, 
so  I  went  over  to  the  treasurer's  office  and  asked 
for  a  room,  a  cheap  room.  He  said  he  had  noth- 
ing but  one-hundred-dollar  rooms  left.  I  thought 
he  was  trying  to  insult  me.  I  felt  badly  about 
it  and  began  to  walk  around  town,  hunting  for 
a  place.  There  was  not  much  assortment  for  the 
price  I  could  pay,  and  by  noon  I  had  found  noth- 
ing.    I  was  disappointed  and  hungry,  went  into 


28     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

a  butcher  shop,  bought  some  bologna,  and  again 
went  down  Witherspoon  Street  near  the  ceme- 
tery, away  from  the  crowd,  to  eat  and  reflect. 

That  afternoon  was  a  long  one  and  I  had  no 
better  success.  The  day  had  kept  the  promise 
of  the  morning  and  it  was  hot.  You  must  re- 
member that  I  was  the  first  man  who  ever  came 
to  Princeton  from  my  school,  and,  outside  of  "L," 
I  knew  no  one  at  all.  What  made  it  hard  was 
the  fact  that  everybody  seemed  to  be  acquainted 
with  everybody  else  and  nobody  knew  me.  My 
home  was  not  a  luxurious  one,  but  home  is  home, 
and  I  wanted  to  be  there.  Yes,  I  was  homesick 
in  those  first  days;  I  wanted  to  be  back  home 
that  first  afternoon;  and  off  and  on  for  many 
days,  yes,  weeks.  At  the  high  school  I  had 
known  almost  everybody  and,  I  dare  say,  was 
fairly  well  liked  by  the  fellows.  I  had  a  boy's 
respect  for  the  opinion  of  my  teachers,  and  now 
when  I  couldn't  find  a  room  at  what  seemed 
to  me  a  reasonable  price,  and  when  everything 
seemed  so  strange,  I  remembered  what  had  hap- 
pened when  I  told  the  principal  that  I  had  made 
up  my  mind  to  go  to  Princeton.    He  shook  his 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    29 

head  and  said:  "Well,  X,  I  like  your  spunk,  but 
I  give  you  six  months  as  an  outside  limit."  My 
spunk  was  pretty  much  gone  and  I  was  thinking 
of  that  outside  limit. 

Before  coming  back  to  Princeton  that  Mon- 
day morning  I  owned,  all  told,  in  my  own  right, 
nine  dollars  and  seventy-five  cents,  and,  except 
for  what  my  bologna  had  cost  me,  I  still  had  it 
with  me,  though  I  was  afraid  from  what  I  had 
learned  about  the  price  of  rooms  that  it  and  I 
would  soon  be  parted.  Prices  seemed  to  me 
frightfully  high.  I  had  imagined  I  heard  a  man 
say  that  he  had  paid  fifteen  cents  for  a  banana. 
I  must  have  been  mistaken,  of  course.  But  the 
money  question  was  a  terribly  important  one, 
and  I  was  trying  to  decide  how  I  could  get  my 
books,  my  room,  and  my  board  paid  far  enough 
ahead  to  give  me  a  chance  to  find  some  work  to 
do.  It  didn't  look  promising,  and  evening  was 
coming  on. 

Just  before  dinner  (supper  I  called  it  then) 
I  met  "L"  again.  He  greeted  me  like  an  old 
friend.    That  helped. 

"Where  are  you  going  to  eat?"  he  asked. 


So     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  told  him  I  thought  I'd  go  out  and  buy  some- 
thing. 

"Why  don't  you  come  to  the  commons?"  he 
put  in. 

"What's  that?" 

"That's  where  we  eat." 

"What  does  it  cost?"  I  asked. 

"You  don't  have  to  pay;  you  just  sign  for  it." 

"Take  me  to  the  place,"  was  all  I  said. 

Now,  I  don't  want  you  to  think  that  I  was  a 
money-grabber.  But  I  tried  to  explain  to  you 
that  a  dollar  looked  mighty  big  to  me  in  those 
days.  In  the  town  that  I  came  from,  where 
everybody  was  fighting  for  money,  money  is  the 
big  thing  in  the  world.  One  of  the  finest  things 
that  my  college  career  has  done  for  me  was  to 
put  the  money  question  in  its  proper  place  in 
my  life.  We  all  want  money,  of  course.  We  all 
need  it.  But  money  has  long  ceased  to  be  the 
tin  god  it  used  to  be.  There  are  other  more  im- 
portant things  in  the  world  for  me  now. 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    31 

Familiarity  Breeds  Contempt 

Well,  there  were  many  other  things  that  I 
had  to  learn  as  a  freshman.  I  had  never  been  in 
a  boarding-house  in  my  life.  I  knew  that  these 
boys  lived  in  a  different  way  from  the  one  to 
which  I  was  accustomed,  and  I  had  sense  enough 
to  know  that  it  was  a  better  way  than  mine,  and 
therefore  made  up  my  mind  that  I  was  going 
to  keep  my  eyes  open  and  watch  them.  So  I 
went  to  the  commons  and  watched  "L"  and  the 
other  students.  The  only  reason  I  didn't  tuck 
my  napkin  into  my  collar  was  because  he  didn't. 
There  are  times  when  it  would  be  pretty  hard 
to  learn  good  table  manners  at  commons.  You 
couldn't  expect  a  crowd  of  lusty  young  chaps 
always  to  be  proper,  but  in  the  first  month  man- 
ners at  commons  were  fine.  The  fellows  put  on 
their  best  because  they  were  strange  to  each 
other  and  were  on  their  good  behavior.  No- 
body knows  as  yet  at  whom  he  dares  throw  a 
biscuit,  and  so  it  doesn't  occur  to  him  to  throw 
one  at  anybody.  It  is  the  familiarity  that  breeds 
the  contempt.    But  I  learned  my  manners  there. 


32     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  signed  for  my  meal,  but  I  also  learned  that  it 
cost  five  dollars  and  fifty  cents  a  week,  and  that 
struck  me  as  exorbitant.  I  had  felt  awkward  at 
commons  with  "L,"  because  I  knew  that  he 
knew  how  these  men  lived  and  I  knew  that  I 
didn't.    He  wasn't  poor  like  myself. 

A  Friend  in  Need 

After  supper  we  walked  out  to  the  street  to- 
gether. It  was  growing  dusk.  I  looked  at  the 
quaint  little  shops  beginning  to  light  up,  and  on 
the  other  side  of  the  street  there  were  some  fel- 
lows with  their  hands  on  each  other's  shoulders, 
singing.  But  it  didn't  cheer  me.  I  saw  that 
for  me  it  was  going  to  be  pretty  hard.  I  hadn't 
yet  found  a  room. 

"Where  are  you  going  to  stay?"  he  asked  me. 

I  told  him  I  hadn't  found  a  place. 

"You  come  along  with  me,"  and  he  took  me 
by  the  arm  and  led  me  to  his  room. 

"Here's  where  you  sleep  to-night." 

It  was  the  first  time  anything  so  good  had 
ever  been  done  for  me  by  a  comparative  stranger. 
I  could  almost  have  cried.    It  was  the  first  special 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    33 

mark  of  kindness  I  encountered  at  Princeton, 
and  I  shall  remember  it  as  long  as  I  live.  The 
room  he  took  me  to  looked  awfully  well  to  me. 
Compared  to  the  one  I  was  used  to,  it  was  very 
fine.  He  had  carpets  or  rugs,  and  to  me  a  carpet 
was  a  thing  for  a  parlor.  When  I  studied  at 
home  in  the  winter  I  had  to  put  my  feet  up  on 
the  stove  because  the  floors  were  so  cold.  Yet 
he  apologized  for  the  looks  of  his  room  and  said 
his  things  were  still  on  the  way.  Now,  I  want  to 
tell  you  that  it  was  a  mighty  fine  thing  of  "L" 
to  take  me  in,  especially  as  he  hardly  knew  me, 
and  as  he  had  only  a  single  bed,  which  he  shared 
with  me. 

I  got  up  early.  He  went  out  to  his  breakfast 
and  classes  and  I  walked  around  the  town.  In- 
cidentally, I  was  getting  cuts  for  my  absences 
from  class,  though  that  didn't  bother  me  because 
I  didn't  know  what  cuts  were.  Somehow  by  a 
kind  of  natural  instinct  I  seemed  to  gravitate 
toward  the  poorer  quarter  of  town.  Outside  of 
the  short  section  of  the  main  street,  that  was  all 
I  had  seen;  and  every  time  I  walked  down  Wither- 
spoon  Street  I  was  greatly  surprised  to  see  what 


34     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

a  one-horse  town  this  was.  For  this  was  the  only 
section  of  it  I  had  yet  noticed.  A  little  later  I 
was  walking  along  Vandeventer  Avenue  looking 
for  signs  in  the  windows,  and  I  saw  one — "  Rooms 
Rented."  I  walked  in.  It  was  the  house  of  a 
retired  minister.  Both  he  and  his  wife  came  to 
the  door.  They,  too,  received  me  as  if  I  had  been 
a  friend.  In  spite  of  "L's"  kindness,  that  lump 
was  still  in  my  throat,  I  still  had  the  lost-boy 
feeling.  And  it  didn't  finally  wear  off  until  I 
had  really  become  one  of  the  crowd.  But  that 
was  not  to  be  for  some  days.  When  this  old 
minister  came  up  and  shook  hands  the  tears  al- 
most came  to  my  eyes.  I  made  up  my  mind  that 
they  were  mighty  fine  people,  and  I  have  always 
kept  that  opinion.  They  seemed  to  take  an  in- 
terest in  me,  asked  me  my  name  and  plans. 
They  had  two  rooms,  the  cheaper  one  two  dol- 
lars a  week.  I  told  them  my  situation  and  that 
I  couldn't  afford  it,  and  they  gave  it  to  me  for 
one  dollar  and  fifty  cents.  It  was  a  little  cubby- 
hole of  a  room,  6x8x9,  and,  although  they  were 
very  good  to  me,  somehow  I  felt  cooped  up  there, 
and  at  the  end  of  the  first  term,  with  much  re- 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    35 

gret,  I  left  them.  But  for  the  present  I  was  set- 
tled, though  my  trunk  had  not  yet  come.  I  went 
back  to  the  campus  feeling  much  better. 

Horsing  Freshmen 

They  were  horsing  freshmen.  Pretty  soon  a 
fellow  comes  up  to  me. 

"Are  you  a  freshman?"  (You  must  remem- 
ber, I  was  committing  the  unforgivable  sin  of 
wearing  a  soft  shirt,  gay  tie,  and  colored  cap.) 
I  said:  "I  am." 

"Qualifying,"  he  asked,  "or  come  from  another 
college?" 

"No." 

"What  are  you  doing  with  that  shirt  on?" 

"Wearing  it,"  I  said.  I  thought  he  was  im- 
pertinent. He  thought  I  was  fresh.  I  guess  he 
was  right. 

"Don't  you  know  freshmen  aren't  allowed  to 
wear  soft  shirts?"  I  didn't,  so  he  advised  me 
to  go  home  and  change  it.  I  didn't  like  the  ad- 
vice, so  I  walked  around  the  corner  of  the  build- 
ing and  came  back  and  looked  him  squarely  in 
the  eye,  the  way  a  boy  looks  at  the  policeman 


36     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

who  has  chased  him  away  from  the  fire.  I  wanted 
to  see  the  fun  and  he  didn't  bother  me.  That 
is,  he  didn't  bother  me  just  then;  my  turn  came 
later.  But,  for  the  moment,  I  innocently  thought 
that  I  had  him  bluffed. 

At  dinner-time,  when  I  was  walking  up  Nassau 
Street,  I  saw  around  the  corner  from  the  com- 
mons another  freshman,  "Y,"  my  classmate, 
now  a  well-known  broad-jumper.  He  had  been 
" requested"  to  take  off  his  coat,  and  now,  in 
his  shirt-sleeves,  with  a  tissue-paper  skirt  around 
his  waist,  was  doing  a  Salome  dance.  I  must 
say  in  all  fairness  to  him  that  he  is  a  far  bet- 
ter broad-jumper  than  Salome  dancer.  But  the 
sophs  weren't  particular.  I  stopped  to  enjoy  it. 
Pretty  soon  that  same  sophomore  who  had  met 
me  on  the  campus  came  up.  "Look  at  the 
freshman!"  and  they  all  turned  my  way,  and 
broke  out  in  a  chorus  of  long-drawn-out  "  Ohs ! " 
They  made  a  ring  around  me. 

"Take  off  that  coat,  freshman !"  I  didn't  like 
to,  because  the  lining  was  ripped  and  the  sleeves 
soiled.  But  I  did.  And  I  want  to  say  right 
now  that  not  one  of  them  made  fun  of  my  torn 


LEARNING  TO  BE  A  FRESHMAN    37 

coat.  I  would  have  hit  any  one  of  them,  if 
he  had. 

"Now,  freshman,  hang  it  up  on  that  hook," 
and  he  pointed.     I  fell  for  it. 

"Where's  the  hook?"  I  asked. 

"You're  pretty  fresh,"  was  the  answer. 

Then  I  saw  the  point.  So  I  suspended  my 
coat  on  the  air  and  let  it  fall,  much  to  their 
amusement.  They  then  made  me  put  on  my 
coat  "right,"  that  is,  with  the  Hning  outside,  and 
another  fellow  said:  "Here,  freshman,  milk  that 
cow,"  and  gave  me  a  bicycle. 

I  milked  the  sprocket. 

But  somehow  it  was  all  good  fun  and  I  rather 
liked  it.  They  were  paying  some  attention  to 
me,  anyway,  and  pretty  soon  I  broke  away,  went 
into  a  dormitory,  dressed  again  as  best  I  could, 
and  went  home.  And,  except  for  that  one  little 
incident  about  my  coat,  I  enjoyed  the  horsing  as 
much  as  they  did. 

Now,  there  are  lots  of  things  against  horsing, 
and  I  may  tell  you  some  later,  but  there  is  one 
good  thing  to  be  said  for  it.  It  is  a  good  thing, 
especially  for  the  lost  fellow  like  myself,  because 


38     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

it  brings  the  boys  together.  They  get  excited, 
talk  over  their  experiences,  and  it  breaks  the  ice. 
The  horsing  I  received  from  the  sophs  was  the 
first  thing  I  had  in  common  with  my  classmates. 
I  began  to  feel  like  one  of  the  rest  of  them  and 
the  homesickness  was  beginning  to  wear  off. 

Was  I  still  worried  about  the  financial  situ- 
ation?   Yes,  but  that's  another  story. 


CHAPTER  III 
FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS 

Getting  Started 

Did  I  have  a  job?  No,  not  yet.  But  I  was 
beginning  to  like  it  here,  to  think  that  it  was 
worth  while.  At  first  I  had  been  doubtful,  but  I 
decided  now  that  I  would  do  everything  I  could 
to  make  it  go.  I  had  established  myself  in  my 
room.  It  was  small,  though  comfortable  enough 
for  the  present,  and  it  was  a  place  that  I  could  go 
to  and  rest  and  feel  myself  myself.  You  know 
what  I  mean.  In  the  crowd  I  was  still  more  or 
less  lost  and  my  room  was  a  kind  of  (I  suppose  I 
might  as  well  say  it)  sanctuary.  I  was  eating 
at  commons  and  was  earning  part  of  my  board 
there.  My  work  consisted  of  dishing  out  desserts 
or  taking  charge  of  a  tobacco-and-candy  stand. 
This  privilege  I  had  received  by  applying  to 
the  undergraduate  chairman  of  the  dining  halls 
committee. 

39 


4o     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  had  decided  I  would  stay.  I  walked  over, 
went  to  class,  and  called  it  square.  It  was  in 
Dickinson  Hall  and  I  was  a  little  late.  The 
professor  was  talking  away  at  a  very  rapid  rate, 
and  it  was  hard  for  me  to  understand  mathe- 
matics even  when  a  man  talked  slowly.  My 
preparation  in  advanced  algebra  wasn't  good, 
and  of  trigonometry  I  knew  little  more  than  that 
there  was  such  a  thing.  What  he  said  was  way 
above  me.  Incidentally,  the  feeling  that  this  in- 
tellectual world  was  beyond  me,  or  rather  that  I 
wasn't  up  to  it,  stayed  with  me  all  year.  This 
bothered  me,  and  one  of  the  hardest  things  I  had 
to  do  was  to  work  down  that  feeling. 

La  Premiere  Classe 

What  struck  me  most  in  that  class?  I'll  tell 
you.  It  was  the  grim  impersonality  of  the  whole 
method  and  system.  That  was  the  greatest 
change  between  my  work  at  school  and  my  work 
at  college.  At  grammar  and  high  school  there 
was  a  very  close  relationship  between  the  stu- 
dent and  the  teachers — I  mean  a  personal  inter- 
est on  the  part  of  the  teachers  in  the  student  as 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  41 

an  individual  outside  of  the  classroom.  I  don't 
mean  the  relation  of  the  preceptor  who  meets  a 
student  at  a  social  function.  Up  to  this  time 
my  teachers  had  given  me  advice  on  the  conduct 
of  life.  From  this  time  on  that  was  over.  It 
seemed  to  me  there  was  a  chasm  between  the 
front  row  of  benches  and  the  teacher's  desk,  there 
was  an  invisible  line  between  the  student  and  the 
faculty.  Each  stayed  in  his  own  sphere.  You 
don't  feel  that?  Let  me  explain.  As  a  fresh- 
man, and  occasionally  since,  when  I  asked  certain 
professors  a  question  I  had  the  feeling  that  I  was 
putting  a  cent  into  a  slot-machine  and  getting 
what  I  wanted,  and  in  some  cases  I  had  no  more 
feeling  of  intimacy  or  personal  relationship  than 
you  have  with  the  slot-machine.  I  don't  mean 
that  this  was  generally  true  or  that  it  was  true 
with  regard  to  my  preceptors.  I  have  come  to 
know  some  of  them  very  well;  but  I  mean  that, 
coming  from  my  own  school,  I  had  the  feeling 
here  that  the  student  lived  in  a  different  world 
from  his  professor.  There  was  a  distance  be- 
tween the  two,  and  the  impersonality  of  that  re- 
lationship to  me  was  at  first  forbidding,  though 


42     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  soon  began  to  work  myself  into  the  system. 
In  my  physics  course  the  things  I  understood 
best  were  the  jokes  of  the  professor  in  charge, 
and  he  told  some  good  ones.  When,  however,  I 
tried  to  make  myself  interesting  and  tell  them 
to  members  of  the  other  classes,  I  found  that  I 
had  been  forestalled.  He  had  done  that  himself. 
Everybody  in  college  knew  them.  They  were 
stock  jokes  and  a  part  of  the  course. 

The  First  Preceptorial 

What  did  I  think  of  my  first  preceptorial  hour? 
I  liked  it  immensely.  The  system  is  one  of  the 
finest  things  about  Princeton,  but  it  seemed  very 
odd  to  me  as  a  freshman  to  be  sitting  in  a  pre- 
ceptor's room  on  a  comfortable  chair  without 
any  formality  and  trying  to  be  natural.  I  had 
some  excellent  preceptors,  one  especially  whose 
hour  I  particularly  enjoyed,  except  for  one  thing. 
He  knew  many  of  the  boys  very  well  and  called 
them  by  their  nicknames.  When  he  called  them 
"Bill"  and  "Jack"  and  me  "Mr."  it  made  me 
feel  more  strongly  that  I  wasn't  one  of  the  crowd. 
What  pleased  me  most  was   the  very  uncere- 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  43 

monious  and  informal  way  we  went  about  it. 
We  lounged  around;  that  is,  they  did  and  I  tried 
to;  we  talked  as  we  pleased  and  uttered  our 
thought  if  we  had  one.  Of  course,  as  freshmen 
we  had  very  few  preceptors,  since  in  most  fresh- 
man subjects  there  are  none. 

Do  the  teachers  generally  understand  men 
like  myself?  No,  and  I  don't  blame  them.  I 
can  give  you  a  case  in  point.  Nobody  had  any 
more  good  will  toward  me  than  this  preceptor, 
yet  one  of  the  things  that  hurt  me  most  hap- 
pened to  me  through  him.  He  knew  that  I  was 
working  my  way  through  and  wanted  to  help 
me.  One  day  he  asked  me  to  stop  after  the 
hour.  He  asked  me,  Would  I  do  something  for 
him?  Of  course  I  would,  and  gladly,  because  I 
felt  that  he  was  doing  a  great  deal  for  me.  He 
gave  me  a  little  note  nicely  wrapped  up  and 
asked  me  if  I  would  stop  at  a  certain  shop  which 
was  on  my  way  and  leave  that  note.  I  was 
really  much  pleased  to  be  able  to  do  him  a  serv- 
ice. The  shop  was  on  the  way  to  my  next 
class  and  it  was  no  trouble  at  all.  I  went  in  and 
gave  the  manager  his  note.    He  looked  at  me  and 


44     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

said:  "You  can  tell  Professor  B  that  I'll  take 
care  of  the  matter."  And  then  he  turned  to  me 
and  said:  "What's  this  quarter  got  to  do  with  it? 
That  doesn't  belong  to  me;  it  must  be  yours." 
"No,"  I  said,  "it  must  be  yours."  He  smiled 
and  started  to  give  me  the  twenty-five  cents.  I 
began  to  see  the  situation.  My  preceptor  had 
sent  me  on  this  friendly  errand  as  an  excuse  for 
giving  me  a  quarter.  I  was  terribly  mortified. 
I  told  the  manager:  "No,  you'll  have  to  give  that 
back  to  Professor  B."  I  wanted  money,  to  be 
sure,  but  I  liked  to  earn  it,  and  not  receive  it  as 
charity.  When  the  preceptor  found  out  how  mat- 
ters stood  he  apologized  all  over  the  lot. 


The  Only  Help  I  Ever  Received 

I  was  keeping  my  eyes  open  for  a  job,  a  real 
job,  I  mean,  and  in  the  meantime  I  was  working 
hard  at  my  studies,  for  you  will  remember  that, 
besides  my  regular  work,  I  had  five  conditions. 
You  ask  me,  "Didn't  I  get  any  help  at  all ? "  Yes, 
I  did.  After  I  had  been  down  here  some  weeks 
I  had  borrowed  one  hundred  dollars  through  my 
mother,  on  condition  that  I  pay  back  one  hun- 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  45 

dred  and  fifty  dollars  the  next  summer.    That 
was  the  only  help  I  ever  received. 

Well,  that  one  hundred  dollars  came  when  I 
needed  it  most  and  I  was  dazed  at  the  sight  of  it. 
It  was  the  biggest  sum  I  had  ever  seen.  But  by 
the  time  it  came  I  already  owed  more  in  Prince- 
ton than  that.  My  bill  had  come  from  the 
treasurer's.  Even  though  you  room  in  town  you 
pay  your  room-rent  through  the  university  of- 
fices. Now,  my  bill  for  tuition,  board,  room-rent, 
library  fee,  laboratory  fee,  infirmary  fee,  gym  fee 
(I  didn't  know  there  could  be  so  many  fees),  had 
more  than  eaten  up  my  hundred.  I  paid  some 
sixty-odd  dollars  to  the  treasurer  on  account,  and 
what  little  remained  left  me  so  fast  that  I  couldn't 
see  it  for  dust.  I  was  soon  very  deeply  in  debt 
and  had  only  made  a  start.  You  can  imagine 
whether  that  worried  me  or  not.  No,  I  hadn't 
spent  much  for  clothes.  I  did  need  a  freshman 
outfit,  and  as  prices  around  here  were  pretty  high 
I  had  it  sent  from  home  and  saved  several  dollars 
by  doing  so.  What  other  shoes  and  clothes  I  had 
to  buy  then  and  through  part  of  my  next  year  I 
bought  in  the  second-hand  shops  on  Witherspoon 
Street.    I  did  that  because  I  had  to. 


46     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

That  Elusive  Job 

Well,  I  was  in  debt  and  desperate  for  a  job. 
Soon  after  I  came  here  I  heard  about  the  Stu- 
dents' Self-Help  Bureau  and  had  registered  with 
them.  They  had  their  office,  in  those  days,  on 
Nassau  Street,  in  the  rooms  of  the  Graduate 
Council.  That  feeling  of  desperation  about  my 
financial  situation  drove  me  nearly  frantic.  Now, 
I  want  to  say  a  word  right  here  about  the  bu- 
reau. There  have  been  two  secretaries  in  my 
time,  both  of  them  certainly  the  right  men  for 
the  right  place.  Most  important  of  all,  they  were 
both  cheerful,  and  I  think  that  is  about  the  first 
requirement  for  a  secretary  of  the  bureau.  A 
man  who  goes  there  is  a  man  in  trouble.  He's 
gloomy;  and  you  mustn't  imagine  that  there  are 
more  jobs  than  men  who  want  them.  There  are 
never  enough  jobs  to  go  around.  I  often  went 
there  at  the  beginning  of  my  freshman  year  and 
was  told  that  there  was  nothing  doing.  But 
I  never  went  there  without  getting  a  certain 
amount  of  cheering  up,  and  I  needed  that  as  much 
as  I  needed  money.    Well,  I  had  seen  the  sign, 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  47 

I  knew  the  place,  and  made  up  my  mind  to  go 
in.  Did  I  feel  backward  about  it?  No,  not  at 
all.  Why  should  I  have  felt  so?  As  I  said  be- 
fore, I  was  used  to  asking  for  what  I  wanted  and 
equally  used  to  being  turned  down.  I  will  give 
you  one  instance. 

Auld  Lang  Syne 

As  far  back  as  the  summer  before  I  entered 
the  high  school  I  thought  I'd  like  to  give  up 
fruit-and-vegetable  peddling  and  get  something 
else  to  do.  I  was  about  fourteen,  and  I  used  to 
leave  home  to  get  over  to  New  York  about  5  a.  m., 
buy  a  World,  a  Journal,  or  any  other  paper  not 
costing  more  than  a  cent,  look  over  the  "help 
wanted,"  pick  the  place  that  looked  best  among 
the  "boy  wanted"  ads,  and  then  start  on  the 
rounds. 

I  went  early  because  there  were  usually  fifty 
fellows  waiting  at  these  places,  strung  out  like 
a  bread-line.  The  job  I  was  after  in  this  case 
was  in  a  printing-house  on  Park  Place.  I  had 
come  early  in  order  to  be  first,  and  sat  down  on 
the  door-step.    Now,  boys  brought  up  like  my- 


48     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

self  get  a  good  deal  of  worldly  wisdom  too  soon. 
But  curiously  enough  what  I  had  learned  at 
school  made  a  strangely  profound  impression  on 
me.  It  comes  to  us  from  another  world.  I  had 
been  told  in  school  that  if  you  were  patient 
you  would  get  things,  and  so  I  used  to  think  in 
all  seriousness  that,  if  I  only  waited,  what  I 
wanted  would  come  to  me  merely  because  I  was 
being  patient.  Now,  that  was  always  hard  for 
me,  so  I  came  early  and  waited  on  the  door-step 
with  a  sense  of  virtue.  After  about  an  hour  a 
large,  burly  negro  with  a  broom  in  his  hand 
came  up,  unlocked  the  door,  and  asked  me  what 
I  wanted. 

"I  want  to  see  the  manager." 

"What  do  you  want  to  see  the  manager 
about?" 

I  thought  he  was  too  inquisitive  for  a  sweeper, 
and  determined  not  to  tell. 

"I'll  tell  the  manager  when  I  see  him,"  and  I 
walked  in. 

"You  don't  want  to  see  the  manager,"  he  said, 
"what  you  want  is  a  job." 

With  that  he  dropped  the  broom,  took  me  by 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  49 

the  collar  of  my  coat  with  one  hand  and  by  the 
seat  of  my  trousers  with  the  other,  and  lifted  me 
out  of  the  place.  I  think  I  can  give  you  an  idea 
of  just  exactly  how  I  felt.  As  I  was  being  bod- 
ily hoisted  out,  I  had  that  sinking  sense  you 
get  when  you  go  up  in  an  elevator  for  the  jirst 
time. 

So  you  can  see  that  I  had  no  hesitation  about 
going  up  to  the  secretary  of  the  Students'  Self- 
Help  Bureau.  I  knew  perfectly  well  before  I 
went  in  that,  whatever  might  happen,  he  couldn't 
treat  me  any  worse  than  that.  I  went  in,  and 
the  long  and  short  of  it  was  he  couldn't  give  me 
a  job,  though  he  did  give  me  a  smile  and  cheered 
me  up.  He  did  more  than  that,  and  I  felt  he  was 
making  a  start.  He  gave  me  a  slip  on  the  strength 
of  which  I  was  to  get  a  certain  reduction  on 
second-hand  books  at  the  university  store.  This 
question  of  books  had  troubled  me.  There  were 
times  when  I  couldn't  buy  a  book  I  needed,  and 
one  of  the  things  I  regret  most  about  my  fresh- 
man year  is  that  once  I  asked  a  preceptor  to  lend 
me  his  book  and  was  refused.  I  left  the  bureau 
in  better  spirits  and  came  back  soon.    The  next 


So     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

time  the  secretary  gave  me  a  ticket  for  the  foot- 
ball game.  That,  too,  was  a  good  thing,  because 
watching  the  game  allowed  me  to  forget  all  my 
troubles.  But  I  went  back  to  the  bureau  almost 
daily  and  I  am  afraid  I  made  myself  a  nuisance. 
It  was  through  the  secretary,  however,  that  I 
got  my  first  job,  soon  after.  It  was  raking  leaves 
at  twenty  cents  an  hour.  It  was  a  half-hour's 
walk  each  way,  and  I  used  to  average  about 
two  and  a  half  hours  of  work  a  day.  The  owner 
of  the  place  treated  us  well — there  was  an- 
other fellow  with  me  on  the  job.  It  was  a  relief 
to  me  to  feel  that  I  had  begun  to  earn  my  way. 
In  two  weeks  I  had  earned  something  like  seven 
dollars.  When  that  job  was  ended,  however, 
I  had  nothing  else  to  do  and  I  was  blue  again. 
In  class  I  seemed  to  be  doing  about  as  well  as 
the  other  boys,  but  financially  I  wasn't  doing 
well  enough,  and  I  was  beginning  to  be  afraid 
that  the  thing  was  going  to  be  a  failure,  and  I 
had  some  blue  weeks  after  I  finished  raking  leaves. 
Debts  were  climbing  up.  I  don't  know  if  I  can 
make  you  understand  this,  but  one  of  the  things 
that  kept  me  up  and  occasionally  made  me  feel 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  51 

ashamed  of  myself  was  a  talk  I  had  once  had 
with  a  negro  at  noon  over  our  dinner  when  we 
were  both  working  on  the  railroad. 

Out  of  the  Mouths  of 


He  was  about  forty.  At  times  a  drunkard,  a 
gambler,  and  a  blacksmith.  Also  a  philosopher. 
He  told  me  that  as  a  lad  he  had  worked  like  a 
horse  to  get  some  money,  put  it  into  a  fool  busi- 
ness which  he  had  started,  made  out  well  for 
a  while,  and  then  lost  it  all.  And  after  he  had 
finished  telling  me  that  story  he  said:  "Well, 
son,  I  liked  that  work,  and  one  of  these  days  I'm 
goin'  back  to  it.  Yes,  sah,  I'm  goin'  back  to  it, 
because  if  yuh  want  to  get  along  in  this  yere 
world  no  thin'  beats  a  trial  but  a  failure."  Now, 
for  a  negro,  that  fellow  had  no  yellow  streak.  I 
learned  something  from  him,  and  I  felt  ashamed 
not  to  go  at  a  thing  as  hard  as  that  fellow  whom 
most  people  would  have  called  a  good-for-noth- 
ing negro.  That  sentence  of  his,  "Nothing  beats 
a  trial  but  a  failure,"  ran  in  my  head.  I  made 
up  my  mind  that  I  was  going  to  do  my  level 
best  not  to  fail.    But  even  if  I  failed,  through  no 


52     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

fault  of  mine,  I'd  go  back  and  make  another 
trial,  and  I  made  up  my  mind  that  if  I  was  go- 
ing to  get  knocked  like  that  negro  I'd  take  my 
knocks  as  he  did  with  a  smile  and  have  the  world 
laugh  with  me  rather  than  at  me. 

Before  my  next  job  I  had  been  without  a  cent — 
I  mean  literally  without  a  cent — for  two  weeks. 
Then  the  secretary  of  the  Self-Help  Bureau  gave 
me  another  job.  It  was  for  the  Harvard  foot- 
ball game  of  that  year  (191 1),  and  I  was  to  sell 
programmes.  When  he  showed  me  that  pro- 
gramme I  was  disappointed.  Why?  For  this 
reason.  I  looked  at  the  programme  and  said  to 
myself:  "That's  a  ten-cent  programme."  That's 
what  it  was  worth.  I  was  to  sell  it  for  fifty  cents. 
Now,  I  was  to  get  five  cents  apiece  for  selling 
them,  and  I  told  the  secretary  that  I  didn't  think 
the  demand  would  be  very  great.  "Well,  if  you 
are  alive,"  he  said,  "you  ought  to  sell  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty.  That's  about  what  the  other  fel- 
lows do."  When  I  got  there  I  stood  around  near 
the  gate  for  over  an  hour  and  sold  two  or  three. 
The  crowd  wasn't  rushing  us  off  our  feet  to  get 
those  programmes.    For  some  disappointing  rea- 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  S3 

son  they  seemed  to  be  getting  along  perfectly 
well  without  them.  I  had  made  up  my  mind 
that  I  had  to  create  the  demand.  I  was  afraid 
that  if  I  didn't  do  this  well  the  secretary  wouldn't 
give  me  another  trial.  So  I  thought  it  over  a 
bit  and  decided  upon  a  scheme.  The  people 
were  beginning  to  crowd  through,  and  I  noticed 
that  a  great  many  of  them  came  in  couples,  a 
young  man  and  a  young  lady.  I  knew  enough 
to  know  that  the  young  man  couldn't  refuse  to 
buy  what  the  young  lady  wanted,  so  I  kept 
handing  the  programmes  to  the  young  ladies. 
They  would  unconsciously  take  what  was  handed 
to  them  and  their  escorts  would  quite  consciously 
pay  me  for  it.  Now,  that  scheme  won  the  day 
for  me,  and  in  the  next  half -hour  I  sold  nearly  one 
hundred  programmes.  Incidentally,  I  felt  that  I 
had  justified  myself  with  the  secretary  and  I 
had  five  dollars  of  the  easiest  money  that  I  had 
ever  earned.  However,  as  this  wasn't  enough  to 
keep  me  afloat,  I  was  willing  to  do  work,  yes,  any 
kind  of  work,  but  I  couldn't  find  the  work  to  do, 
and  the  idea  of  my  expenses  was  simply  stagger- 
ing me. 


54     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

Unskilled  Labor 

A  little  after  the  cold  weather  had  begun  I 
got  my  third  job.  I  was  to  take  care  of  a  furnace 
in  a  professor's  house.  This  meant  a  fairly  steady 
job  at  seven  dollars  a  month  and  for  me  a  com- 
paratively easy  one.  I  was  to  go  twice  a  day, 
morning  and  evening.  All  that  was  very  well, 
only  I  honestly  didn't  know  a  thing  about  a  fur- 
nace. I  had  never  seen  one  in  action.  One  use- 
ful fact  I  did  know — I  knew  only  that  there  were 
various  kinds  of  furnaces.  I  put  that  fact  to 
hard  use.  When  I  went  to  the  house  the  pro- 
fessor went  down  into  the  cellar  with  me  and 
showed  me  the  furnace. 

"Of  course,"  he  said,  "you  have  taken  care  of 
a  furnace  before?" 

What  could  I  say?  If  I  told  him  I  hadn't  I 
couldn't  get  the  job.    So  I  played  safe  and  said: 

"You  know,  sir,  that  there  are  various  kinds 
of  furnaces." 

"Yes,"  he  said,  "and  I'll  explain  this  one  to 
you." 

That's  what  I  wanted.    I  have  taken  care  of 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  55 

many  furnaces  since  and  I  owe  that  man  a  good 
deal.  His  cellar  was  my  laboratory.  I  experi- 
mented on  that  furnace.  Every  day  I'd  try  some- 
thing new — open  a  new  draft  or  try  a  new  way 
of  checking — and  I'm  afraid  that  on  warm  days 
my  good  friend  the  professor  roasted  and  on  cold 
days  he  froze.  I'm  sorry  for  that,  because  he 
was  kind  and  nice  about  it.  But  down  in  the 
cellar  we  had  good  times  together,  that  furnace 
and  I,  and,  on  the  strength  of  what  I  learned 
then,  I  got  four  other  furnaces  to  take  care  of 
the  next  year. 

At  Thanksgiving  I  went  home.  Christmas 
was  coming  on  and  things  were  looking  blue. 

Making  Money  at  Concerts 

Did  I  get  any  amusement?  Yes,  I  always 
have  done  that.  You  mean  anything  special? 
Why,  yes,  I  had  to  have  some  pleasure.  Besides 
ordinary  amusements,  I  went  to  lectures  and  I 
went  to  concerts!  I  have  to  smile  now  when  I 
think  about  the  first  philharmonic.  No,  I  didn't 
know  anything  about  music.  I  went  for  three 
reasons.    The  first  and  by  far  the  most  important 


$6     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

was  because  it  cost  one  dollar  and  fifty  cents  and 
students  could  get  in  free.  I  was  making  money ! 
In  the  second  place,  I  was  curious.  I  went  to 
see  what  people  were  paying  one  dollar  and  fifty 
cents  for.  And  in  the  third  place — and  this  grad- 
ually came  to  be  more  and  more  important*— -I 
wanted  to  get  a  liking  for  music.  I  have  gone  to 
all  the  concerts  here,  to  the  Whiting  lectures  and 
recitals  every  year,  and  I  have  learned  to  like 
music  even  though  I  don't  know  why  I  like  it. 
Of  course,  I  don't  know  technic,  but  it  has  come 
to  mean  a  good  deal  to  me  and  has  been  far  more 
than  a  mere  amusement. 

Winter  was  now  here  and  the  days  were  less 
cheerful.  On  the  streets  I  always  wore  a  smile. 
But  when  I  sat  at  home  in  my  room  and  watched 
the  first  snows  blow  down  the  street  I  was  at 
times  pretty  glum.  I  remember  sitting  at  my 
window  and  hoping  it  would  snow  hard.  I  thought 
it  would  bring  me  a  chance  to  earn  a  little  money 
shovelling  paths.  In  December  there  was  the 
first  light  snow-storm,  and  I  did  get  a  few  such 
chances,  but  that  didn't  help  much,  and  I  couldn't 
count  on  it. 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  57 

Did  I  now  have  the  feeling  that  I  belonged 
here?  No,  I  had  the  feeling  that  I  didn't.  The 
other  fellows  were  better  men  than  I,  and  I  knew 
it.  I  couldn't  really  get  into  the  crowd.  I  don't 
believe  they  knew  it,  at  least  I  don't  believe  they 
could  tell  it  from  my  talk,  but  when  I  was  with 
them  in  crowds  I  somehow  had  the  feeling  that  I 
would  have  in  a  parlor  among  ladies,  and  you 
might  guess  that  I  wouldn't  feel  at  home  there. 
This  feeling  of  awkwardness  was  one  of  the  big- 
gest handicaps  I  worked  under.  If  I  hadn't  had 
it,  it  would  have  been  much  better  and  much 
easier  for  me.  Work  was  coming  in  very  slowly 
and  expenses  were  climbing  up.  I  didn't  dare 
think  of  what  I  owed.  Every  week  it  was  run- 
ning higher.  Meantime  I  felt  desperately  blue, 
like  that  fellow  in  "Les  Miserables"  who  is  go- 
ing down  in  the  quicksands  and  can't  pull  him- 
self out. 

Don't  Worry 

When  I  had  come  here  I  went  to  the  treasurer's 
office  and  explained  my  situation.  I  told  them 
when  they  made  out  my  university  bill  not  to 


S&     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

send  it  home.  It  wouldn't  do  them  any  good, 
for  they  would  waste  their  postage  and  it  would 
worry  my  people.  They  were  to  send  it  to  me. 
They  did.  Those  notices  from  the  treasurer's 
office  kept  coming  with*  distressing  regularity,  and 
every  time  one  came  I  went  to  the  office  and  paid 
them  in  excuses.  That  was  all  I  had.  One  week 
— we  were  now  running  toward  Christmas — they 
sent  me  their  bill.  I  was  so  blue  that  I  didn't 
dare  think  about  it,  so  I  put  it  in  my  pocket 
and  thought  I'd  try  to  settle  it  when  I  could  really 
face  my  own  situation.  Honestly,  I  didn't  dare 
think  about  it.  A  little  later  a  letter  came  from 
home  enclosing  a  bill.  It  was  my  last  bill  from 
the  treasurer  and  it  was  marked:  "Copy;  orig- 
inal sent  to  the  student  at  his  request."  With  it 
was  a  letter  from  my  mother.  She  was  very 
much  distressed  and  wondered  why  I  could  live 
so  extravagantly  and  how  I  was  going  to  get 
the  money  to  pay  for  it  all.  That  bothered  me. 
I  simply  couldn't  see  ahead.  If  I  tried,  things 
went  black  before  my  eyes.  I  couldn't  explain 
to  the  folks  at  home,  but  I  wanted  to  ease  their 
minds,  so  I  sent  back  the  shortest  letter  I  ever 


FIGHTING  AGAINST  ODDS  59 

wrote  in  my  life.  "Don't  worry."  That  was  the 
letter.  Why  should  they?  I  was  doing  that 
myself. 

A  few  hours  later  I  felt  a  little  better  about 
it  and  went  over  to  the  office.  I  brought  out 
the  copy  of  the  bill  which  my  mother  had  sent 
me  and  laid  it  on  the  desk.  I  said:  "Why  did 
you  send  this  home?  I  still  have  the  original.,, 
Now,  the  treasurer  has  always  treated  me  splen- 
didly, and  the  man  at  the  desk  answered:  "Why, 
you  weren't  paying  anything  on  it."  I  told 
him  I  didn't  have  it.  I  made  arrangements  with 
him  that  I  was  to  pay  him  whatever  I  could 
whenever  I  could,  and  I  did  my  best.  He  was 
very  nice  about  it,  and  has  always  given  me  more 
leeway  than  I  had  a  right  to  hope  for.  But  with 
all  the  leeway  I  didn't  see  how  I  was  ever  going 
to  catch  up.  I  was  falling  so  far  behind  the  pro- 
cession that  I  couldn't  hear  the  band.  And  it 
seemed  to  be  getting  worse  instead  of  better. 
The  holidays  were  coming  on  and  it  looked  like 
a  dreary  Christmas.  My  work — I  mean  my 
studies — suffered,  too.  I  used  to  sit  in  my  room, 
read  a  couple  of  pages,  and  find  that  I  had  been 


6o     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

reading  words  and  not  ideas.  It  looked  bad, 
and  I  was  awfully  anxious  to  see  the  folks.  It 
was  some  relief  to  think  that  the  vacation  was 
coming.  I  counted  the  days,  and  after  my  last 
long  recitation  hour  I  left  for  home. 


CHAPTER  IV 

DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA 

My  visit  at  home  and  the  holiday  bucked  me 
up  and  gave  me  a  new  lease  of  life.  I  had  been 
a  little  homesick  and  in  hard  luck.  But  I  didn't 
want  to  give  up  the  ship  and  admit  that  I  had 
been  beaten,  and  to  be  pointed  at  on  the  streets 
of  my  home  town  as  the  man  who  had  started  to 
go  to  college  and  gave  it  up.  I  had  the  notion, 
and  I  think  it's  pretty  nearly  correct,  that  any- 
thing you  don't  carry  through  to  some  conclusion 
is  going  to  stand  out  against  you;  and  there  was 
something  else  that  drove  me  back.  In  those 
two  weeks  I  saw  again  the  old  life  that  went  on 
around  me  and  which  I  would  fall  into  if  I  stayed, 
and  I  couldn't  help  contrasting  it  with  the  life  of 
men  at  college.  Even  my  struggle  there  in  those 
first  hard  months,  as  I  looked  back  at  it,  seemed 
quite  tolerable.  I  liked  my  studies,  felt  that  I 
was  getting  into  them,  and  didn't  want  to  give 

61 


62     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

them  up.  Besides,  I  saw  that  old  teacher  of 
mine  who  had  given  me  six  months,  and  I  said  to 
myself,  "I'm  going  to  fool  you,  anyway";  and 
took  the  train  for  Princeton. 

I  arrived  a  few  days  after  college  opened.  That 
treasurer's  bill  was  still  hanging  over  me.  It 
was  the  sword  of  Damocles.  But  I  had  decided 
during  the  vacation  that  I  wasn't  going  to  leave 
the  university  unless  I  absolutely  had  to. 

Easy  Money 

Before  Christmas  I  had  been  working  hard  at 
my  conditional  studies  and  had  passed  off  all 
but  one  of  my  entrance  conditions.  I  was  be- 
tween the  devil  and  the  deep  sea.  If  I  didn't 
study  hard,  and  failed  to  pass  my  work,  the  uni- 
versity would  flunk  me  out;  and  if  I  didn't  work 
hard  and  earn  money  to  pay  my  bills,  the  treas- 
urer would  drive  me  out.  So  now  that  the  studies 
were  fairly  well  in  hand  I  made  up  my  mind  that 
I  was  going  to  go  out  after  other  work.  I  had 
heard  that  there  was  a  job  to  be  had  at  twenty- 
five  cents  an  hour.  I  made  up  my  mind  to  try 
for  it,  for  several  reasons.    I  needed  money  badly, 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  63 

never  needed  it  so  badly  in  my  life.  And  right 
here  I'd  like  to  say  that  any  encouragement  or 
help  that  is  to  be  given  to  the  man  working  his 
way  through  college  ought  to  be  given  him  in 
those  months  between  September  and  Christ- 
mas of  his  first  year.  That's  when  he  needs  it 
most  and  when  he  is  least  able  to  earn  money  for 
himself,  and  when  in  all  probability,  like  myself 
he  will  have  most  trouble  with  his  studies. 

Now,  twenty-five  cents  an  hour  was  more 
money  than  I  had  ever  earned,  that  is,  steadily. 
Twenty  cents  I  had  earned  for  a  while  when 
I  worked  on  the  railroad  in  the  summer  of  my 
junior  year  in  the  high  school.  To  feel  that  I 
was  earning  twenty-five  cents  an  hour  regularly 
would  help  me  to  feel  that  I  was  going  up  in  the 
world.  I  suppose  you  don't  understand  that. 
But  that's  the  way  it  looked  to  me  then.  Now, 
this  work  was  with  the  Students'  Pressing  Es- 
tablishment. It  consisted  in  going  about  to  the 
students'  rooms  collecting  clothes,  and  bringing 
back  from  ten  to  twelve  suits,  which,  after  they 
had  been  pressed,  I  delivered  again.  I  got  that 
job,  and  that  was  really  my  first  regular  "situa- 


64     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

tion."  Do  you  know  how  much  ten  or  twelve 
suits  weigh  when  you  carry  the  coats  on  your 
arm  and  the  trousers  over  your  shoulder?  Well, 
you  can  guess.  Once  I  carried  as  many  as  seven- 
teen suits;  yet  I  swear  to  you  that  knowing  I 
was  earning  twenty-five  cents  an  hour  made  the 
load  light.  It  was  the  easiest  way  to  earn  money 
I  had  yet  found.  It  paid  most  for  doing  least. 
I  began  to  work  four  and  five  hours  a  day,  some 
days  eight,  and  at  the  same  time  I  began  to  like 
college. 

But  you  must  not  imagine  from  that  that  the 
war  was  over.  It  had  only  begun.  There  were 
going  to  be  many  bad  days,  months — yes,  I  might 
even  say  there  was  going  to  be  one  more  lean 
year.  But,  as  I  look  back  upon  it  now,  my  tak- 
ing up  with  that  work  for  the  Pressing  Estab- 
lishment was  my  start  toward  what  I  might  call 
success.  Did  I  earn  a  great  deal  at  it?  No,  I 
cannot  say  that.  I  did  earn  what  seemed  to  me 
a  considerable  sum,  but  that  wasn't  the  most 
important  thing  about  this  new  phase  in  my 
economic  situation. 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  65 

Tribulations  of  a  Freshman 

Before  I  tell  you  what  I  consider  to  have  been 
the  advantages  which  this  new  field  offered  me, 
I  might  say  a  word  about  the  difficulties  that 
confront  the  freshman  particularly.  Of  course, 
you  know  that  in  college  life  he  is  the  under  dog. 
He  is,  in  the  first  place,  the  cat  in  the  strange 
garret;  he  doesn't  know  his  way  around.  In 
the  second  place,  he  is  made  to  feel  that  he  has 
no  rights  in  comparison  with  a  sophomore,  to  say 
nothing  of  an  upper  classman.  Now,  there  are, 
of  course,  a  great  many  men  who  apply  to  the 
Self-Help  Bureau  in  a  year,  the  average  here 
being  somewhere  between  one  hundred  and 
twenty-five  and  two  hundred.  Many  of  these 
men  are  sophomores  and  upper  classmen.  For 
the  most  part  they  have  picked  up  what  we  call 
the  "gravy"  jobs.  Many  of  the  men  are  will- 
ing to  work,  but  are  unwilling  to  accept  any- 
thing that  would  seem  ungenteel.  They  would 
refuse  a  chance  to  wash  windows  or  to  mow 
a  lawn.  Now,  it  is  these  ungenteel  jobs,  and 
even  relatively  few  of  these,  that  can  at  first  be 


66     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

given  to  the  freshmen.  The  bureau,  of  course, 
tries  to  do  its  best  for  all  the  men,  but  it  does  not 
have  jobs  enough  to  go  around.  As  yet  it  had 
been  able  to  give  me  no  steady  employment,  un- 
less you  could  consider  the  work  I  did  on  the  good 
professor's  furnace  as  such,  and  from  the  way  I 
did  that  I  was  living  in  daily  terror  of  losing  it. 
Of  course,  I  also  had  my  work  at  the  commons, 
which  relieved  me  of  part  of  my  board  bill. 

A  Fool's  Paradise 

Among  other  difficulties  that  the  freshman 
has  to  contend  with  is  the  fact  that  he  can  never 
believe  what  is  told  him  by  a  sophomore,  because, 
of  course,  nothing  delights  a  sophomore  so  much 
as  to  put  one  over  on  his  unsuspecting  victim. 
So  the  poor  freshman's  life,  in  Webster's  phrase, 
is  a  "general  mist  of  error."  Everything,  even 
a  job,  comes  to  him  in  a  questionable  shape.  He 
is  always  wondering  what  is  going  to  happen  to 
him  next,  and  college  customs  are  deep  and  un- 
fathomable mysteries.  I  will  give  you  an  in- 
stance. 

Horsing  season  was  about  over,  and  I  had  an 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  67 

impression  that  conditions  would  improve  and 
that  the  sophomores  were  now  going  to  make  it 
up  to  us.  You  know,  of  course,  that  some  time 
early  in  the  session  the  freshman  class  is  sup- 
posed to  have  its  picture  taken,  and  that  the 
sophomores  consider  it  one  of  their  most  serious 
class  responsibilities  to  "gum"  that  picture,  and 
they  do  usually  gum  it  for  fair  by  throwing 
bags  of  wet  farina,  flour  paste,  or  any  other 
convenient  sticky  stuff  on  the  posing  freshies. 
As  yet  I  wasn't  Johnny  Wise  to  all  this,  so  when 
I  was  tipped  off  that  the  "flour  picture"  was 
to  be  taken  I  said:  "I'll  be  there  with  bells!"  I 
had  a  notion  that  the  class  would  all  stand  up 
together  and  that  we  would  be  pelted  with  flowers 
by  the  reconciled  sophomores.  Visions  of  pink 
carnations  flitted  through  my  mind.  I  went  back 
to  my  room,  dressed  in  my  best,  with  a  fine  new 
collar  and  dapper  little  bow  tie,  and  started  for 
the  steps  of  Whig  Hall.  I  was  a  little  bit  proud 
of  myself  and  wanted  a  prominent  place  in  that 
picture.  The  friendly  sophomores  were  crowding 
around,  but  by  the  time  the  camera  man  was 
ready  I  discovered  that  instead  of  carnations  the 


68     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

flour  for  the  picture  was  Washburn  &  Crosby's, 
and  it  didn't  jibe  well  with  my  blue  suit.  No, 
sirree!  Those  sophs  didn't  pin  any  roses  on  us! 
If  I  had  known,  I  would,  of  course,  have  gone  in 
my  black  jersey  and  corduroys  and  saved  myself 
a  day's  work  in  cleaning  my  Sunday  suit.  As 
a  freshman  I  was  living  continually  in  a  fool's 
paradise. 

You  will  remember  that  I  was  working  at 
commons.  At  dinner  I  was  supposed  to  put  in 
thirty  minutes  dishing  out  desserts.  On  Sun- 
days it  was  ice-cream.  Another  fellow  was  as- 
sociated with  me;  he  was  supposed  to  do  what  I 
did.  He  happened  to  be  a  sophomore,  but,  in- 
stead of  working  with  me,  he  worked  me.  I  had 
been  told  to  do  whatever  a  sophomore  told  me, 
because  if  I  got  one  down  on  me  the  whole  class 
would  get  after  me,  so  I  had  decided  to  show  this 
sophomore  respect  even  if  I  didn't  feel  it.  He 
used  to  throw  biscuits  at  the  waiter's  head  and 
then  look  innocent  while  the  waiter  with  the  tray 
on  his  hand  looked  daggers  at  me.  We  were 
supposed  to  dish  out  a  twenty-five-gallon  can  of 
ice-cream  apiece.     He  used  to  stand  and  watch 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  69 

me  do  my  work,  and  when  I  had  finished  would 
order  me  to  do  his.  For  a  while  I  did.  But  one 
Sunday  afternoon  the  cup  overflowed,  and  I  re- 
belled.    Going  up  to  him,  I  said: 

"Say,  are  you  running  this  place  or  are  you 
supposed  to  work  here  the  same  as  I?" — and  I 
rolled  up  my  sleeves  for  "work."  He  thought 
I  was  rather  fresh,  and  told  me  so;  but  he  did  his 
own  work  that  week  and,  so  far  as  I  was  con- 
cerned, every  week  thereafter. 

Now,  I  am  free  to  say  that  this  sophomore  was 
not  typical,  but  I  have  no  doubt  that  as  long  as 
there  are  freshmen  and  sophomores  some  fresh- 
men will  do  more  work  than  they  are  paid  for — 
and  some  sophomores  less. 

An  Undergraduate  Business  Man 

The  service  that  the  Self-Help  Bureau  renders 
lies  in  the  fact  that  it  can  take  account  of  the 
various  qualifications  of  the  new  applicants  and 
then  give  them  a  start.  When  a  man  has  special 
qualifications,  when  he  knows  a  particular  trade, 
is  an  acceptable  stenographer,  for  instance,  it 
is  fairly  easy  to  get  him  started  in  his  line  of 


7o     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

work.  I  was  unfortunate  in  the  fact  that  I  had 
no  trade.  When,  finally,  I  had  found  a  place  in 
the  Pressing  Establishment,  I  was  started  along 
a  particular  line.  I  was  forced  by  necessity  to 
become  what  you  might  call  an  undergraduate 
business  man,  and  the  first  step  necessary  to 
success  was  to  know  the  world  that  I  had  to 
deal  with.  I  also  learned  there  what  qualities 
I  had  to  possess.  In  the  first  place,  there  is  one 
thing  the  student  is  famous  for — it  is  his  unre- 
liability. I  made  up  my  mind  that  here  I  would 
have  to  be  the  exception,  and  I  pride  myself 
that  I  have  tried  to  keep  my  engagements,  as 
any  man  in  business  would  do. 

The  second  point  was  of  equal  importance. 
In  my  new  work  I  came  to  know  the  student 
well,  and,  of  course,  you  know  his  world  is  not 
the  world  outside  or  the  world  that  I  was  used 
to.  All  men  in  college  have  certain  points  in 
common,  but  they  differ  as  much  among  them- 
selves as  do  men  in  the  world,  and  I  learned  to 
know  their  differences.  My  work  carried  me  into 
the  rooms  of  a  very  large  number  of  students.  I 
saw  them  all,  and  learned  to  know  them  as  they 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  71 

are  and  not  as  they  pretend  to  be.  There  are 
these  two  phases  to  every  student's  personality, 
as  there  are  to  every  other  man's.  I  learned  to 
know  the  soul  "he  faces  the  world  with"  as  well 
as  that  smaller,  and  sometimes  finer,  soul  which 
is  his  in  private.  I  went  into  the  various  rooms 
at  any  and  all  hours  of  the  day  and  saw  the  men 
in  their  undress  personalities.  I  watched  them  at 
their  games;  and  I  could  tell  the  character  of  a 
fellow  by  the  way  he  showed  himself  in  his  play — ■ 
how  he  bore  himself  as  a  loser  and  as  a  winner. 
I  could  also  tell  something  about  the  way  in 
which  he  had  to  be  approached  from  the  kind  of 
room  he  lived  in  and  by  the  kind  of  company  he 
kept. 

In  my  freshman  year,  through  my  new  work,  I 
therefore  learned  to  know  about  four-fifths  of 
the  men  in  college.  I  likewise  knew  the  location 
of  every  room  on  the  campus,  and  picked  up  a 
pretty  large  store  of  miscellaneous  information; 
for  the  man  from  the  Pressing  Establishment  is 
like  the  player  in  Shakespeare — he  has  his  exits 
and  his  entrances. 


72     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

Between  Two  Fires 

But  you  must  not  imagine  that  after  this 
one  job  I  was  rolling  in  wealth  or  that  I  was  to 
have  a  joy-ride  through  the  rest  of  my  freshman 
year.  That  was  not  to  come  until  a  few  years 
later.    Yes,  I'm  taking  that  now. 

In  the  period  from  September  to  Christmas, 
for  all  my  efforts,  the  work  that  I  had  found  had 
netted  me  exactly  thirty  dollars  and  thirty-three 
cents.  The  remainder  of  the  little  sum  which  I 
had  received  from  home  had  melted  away  like 
snow  in  the  sun.  I  find  that  for  the  year,  in- 
cluding tuition  and  all  charges,  my  average  ex- 
penses were  about  ten  dollars  and  fifty  cents  a 
week.  I  was  deeply  in  debt,  and  even  with  the 
best  I  could  do  I  was  falling  farther  behind. 
Furthermore,  my  first  examinations  were  coming 
along  and  I  knew  that  I  must  pass  them.  In  the 
free  time  that  I  had  had  before  Christmas,  you 
will  remember  that  I  had  studied  and  passed  off 
entrance  conditions,  but  I  was  far  from  being 
up  with  my  regular  studies;  so  I  was  in  that  con- 
tinual dilemma  of  which  I  spoke — I  did  not  dare 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  73 

neglect  my  studies  for  fear  of  the  faculty,  and  I 
did  not  dare  neglect  my  work  for  fear  of  the 
treasurer.  Somehow,  it  was  one  long  fight  with 
and  against  myself  to  stay  in.  While  I  was  do- 
ing my  work  I  worried  about  my  lessons,  and 
while  I  was  studying  I  worried  about  money. 
Of  the  two,  however,  it  was  the  money  question 
that  worried  me  most.  This  was  so  because  I 
knew  that  if  I  had  the  time  I  could  get  up  my 
studies,  but  with  all  the  time  in  the  world,  with- 
out a  job,  I  could  not  earn  the  money  I  abso- 
lutely had  to  have,  for  there  was  a  limit  to  what 
I  could  do  in  the  Pressing  Establishment. 

But  somehow  the  days  passed  and  we  ran 
into  the  feverish  week  of  mid-year  examinations. 
I  managed  to  pass  them,  but  had  nothing  to 
spare. 

The  Black  Hand 

With  the  beginning  of  the  second  term  troubles 
came  back,  if  I  can  be  said  to  have  forgotten 
them  at  all.  There  was  still  a  heavy  balance 
due  on  my  first  term's  bill  from  the  treasurer, 
but  I  had  moved  to  the  campus  and  was  begin- 


74     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

ning  to  feel  comfortable.  One  day  when  I  came 
back  after  my  rounds  I  found  waiting  for  me 
the  treasurer's  second-term  bill.  Those  bills  are 
made  out  for  the  entire  term's  expenses.*  It  was 
like  a  letter  from  the  Black  Hand.  It  simply 
knocked  the  spots  out  of  me.  It  called  for  about 
one  hundred  and  thirty-seven  dollars.    This  in 

*  Note. — I  have  the  permission  of  the  student  who  is  here  telling 
his  story  to  print  the  record  of  his  freshman  expenses  as  taken  from 
his  diary.  This  record  is  particularly  interesting  when  compared  with 
the  minimum  statement  of  expenses  as  estimated  in  the  university 
catalogue.  That  statement,  which  excludes  certain  laboratory  fees, 
apparatus  deposits,  books,  hall  dues,  clothes,  room  furnishings, 
incidentals,  travelling  and  vacation  expenses,  calls  for  $384.  This 
student's  statement  includes  absolutely  every  item  of  expense  from 
the  time  of  his  entrance  in  September  until  August  of  the  following 
year.  It  should  be  remembered  that  he  received  a  reduction  on  his 
tuition  and  board,  but  his  statement  given  below  includes  every 
item  that  he  actually  paid  out  in  that  period: 

Tuition,  room-rent,  and  board $191 .00 

Text-books 14-39 

Laundry  (sent  most  of  it  home) 2 .  79 

Clothing  (including  shoes,  haberdashery,  etc.) 14 .  20 

Car-fare 40 

Candy,  etc .90 

Spreads  and  lunches 3 .  85 

Postals  and  stamps 3 .40 

Athletic  dues  and  goods  (including  basket-ball  shoes,  basket- 
ball suit,  etc.) 10.85 

Amusements 5 .  06 

Medical  expenses 4.15 

Travelling  expenses 21 .  88 

Furniture 20 .  93 

Sundries 27 .  10 

Total $320.90 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  75 

addition  to  what  I  already  owed! — and  not 
counting  incidentals.  It  gave  me  a  queer  feel- 
ing; you  know  it,  the  feeling  you  have  when  your 
Adam's  apple  is  beginning  to  choke  you. 

I  sat  and  looked  at  the  wall.  It  offered  no  con- 
solation. I  started  to  do  a  little  bookkeeping — 
all  told,  I  owed  in  Princeton  about  two  hundred 
dollars;  and  incidentals  for  the  next  four  months 
would  amount  to  at  least  thirty  or  forty  dollars 
more.  To  stay  in  college  and  break  even  I  would 
have  to  earn  two  hundred  and  thirty  dollars.  I 
felt  at  that  time  that  twenty-five  cents  an  hour 
was  good  pay.  At  this  rate,  in  the  next  eighteen 
weeks  I  would  have  to  put  in  nine  hundred  and 
twenty  hours'  work.  That  meant  fifty-one  hours 
a  week,  or  pretty  nearly  nine  hours  a  day — ex- 
cluding studies.  Do  you  wonder  at  my  seeing 
red?    I  didn't  like  the  prospect ! 

That  statement  which  the  principal  had  made 
when  I  left  for  Princeton  again  came  back  to  me: 
"I'll  give  you  six  months  as  an  outside  limit." 

I  began  to  wonder  whether  he  hadn't  been  too 
liberal  and  whether  I  hadn't  stayed  too  long. 
When  a  fellow's  in  the  dumps  that  way  he  prac- 


76     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

tically  loses  what  little  nerve  he  has — he's  bull- 
dozed by  what  he  is  up  against.  All  I  could  do 
was  to  stare  at  that  balance  and  wonder  what  I'd 
do  with  it.  I  couldn't  wish  it  off;  I  couldn't  go 
away  and  leave  it — the  debt  would  follow  me. 
Well,  I  felt  there  was  no  place  to  go  but  out — 
so  I  went.  I  wanted  action.  It  got  so  black 
before  my  eyes  I  couldn't  see  a  thing.  I  went 
down  to  the  gym  and  played  basket-ball  for  three 
and  a  half  hours,  until  I  was  absolutely  exhausted 
physically;  then  I  went  home  and  fell  into  bed; 
and  I  got  up  in  the  morning  feeling  fine. 

When  in  trouble,  go  to  the  gym.  That  was 
my  rule.  You  always  feel  better  in  the  morning, 
anyway.  I  suppose  the  bill  was  still  just  as 
large,  but  I  didn't  think  about  it. 

But  that  feeling  of  being  up  against  an  im- 
possible proposition  was  with  me  off  and  on  for 
nearly  all  the  rest  of  the  year.  It  finally  wore  off. 
I  wore  it  off  because  it  was  simply  impossible  to 
go  on  that  way,  and  whenever  it  seemed  to  be 
getting  the  better  of  me  I'd  go  down  to  the  gym 
and  sweat  it  out.  But  gradually,  while  I  was  car- 
rying the  clothes  to  and  from  the  shop,  I  noticed 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  77 

that  the  spring  was  catching  up  with  me,  and 
you  know  when  a  fine  day  comes  and  you  look 
at  the  fellows  and  everybody's  happy,  you  for- 
get everything.    Well,  so  did  I. 

Daylight  at  Last 

Besides  my  work  at  the  Pressing  Establishment, 
when  the  baseball  season  opened  I  sold  pro- 
grammes at  the  games,  and  gradually  I  cut  down 
that  big  balance  at  the  treasurer's.  It  was  still 
uncomfortably  large,  but  we  were  jogging  along 
toward  summer,  and  what's  the  treasurer's  bill 
compared  with  a  fine  spring  day,  with  a  lot  of 
the  fellows  around,  and  everybody  smiling  and 
happy !  The  campus  was  beginning  to  be  beau- 
tiful; the  grass  was  green  and  the  leaves  were 
out.  One  evening  when  I  came  back  from  the 
commons  I  heard  the  seniors  singing  on  the  steps 
of  Nassau  Hall.  It  looked  to  me  as  if  I  were 
going  to  see  the  finish  of  that  year,  after  all. 

I  had  heard  rumors  to  the  effect  that  the  uni- 
versity was  going  to  start  a  farm  and  give  em- 
ployment to  some  of  the  students  during  the 
summer.    The  university  owned  a  large  tract  of 


78     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

land  south  of  the  campus,  and,  instead  of  allowing 
it  to  lie  idle,  decided  to  turn  it  over  to  students 
who  wished  to  farm  it.  One  fine  Saturday  morn- 
ing I  made  one  of  my  usual  visits  to  the  secretary 
of  the  Self-Help  Bureau.  He  told  me  that  I  had 
better  talk  fast,  as  he  had  to  see  the  president  in 
five  minutes. 

"Two  minutes  is  all  I  want,"  I  said.  I  was 
out  of  that  office  in  a  minute  and  a  half,  and  in 
the  meantime  had  secured  a  ticket  for  the  Ford- 
ham  baseball  game  and  the  promise  of  a  job  dur- 
ing the  summer  on  the  Princeton  Farm  at  two 
dollars  a  day.  Needless  to  say,  I  enjoyed  that 
Fordham  game ! 

That  promise  of  a  job  in  the  summer  put  a 
new  light  on  things,  for  with  what  I  could  earn 
before  commencement  and  during  the  summer  I 
saw  that  I  could  enter  in  the  fall  with  a  clean 
slate  for  sophomore  year.  The  exams  came  on, 
but  they  had  lost  most  of  their  terrors — or  else 
I  had  lost  my  respect  for  them;  in  any  case  I 
passed  them;  and  after  the  last  exam,  with  the 
rest  of  the  freshmen,  I  threw  my  black  cap — that 
emblem  of  the  freshman's  infamy — out  of  the 


DEVIL  AND  DEEP  SEA  79 

window  and  ran  out  and  trampled  on  the  grass 
to  show  that  I  was  now  a  full-fledged  sophomore 
and  enjoyed  all  the  privileges  of  a  college  student. 
I  had  stuck  out  my  year  and  was  feeling  fine.  I 
went  over  to  the  Univee  Store,  bought  that  picture 
postal  of  a  tiger,  the  Princeton  pennant,  and  the 
college  cheer.  Under  it  I  wrote,  in  a  large,  bold 
hand: 

"Greetings  from  Princeton," 

signed  my  name,  and  sent  it  to  that  principal 
who  had  given  me  six  months  as  an  outside  limit. 
He  had  nothing  on  me. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE 

Well,  I  was  a  sophomore.  Did  I  swagger? 
Sure.  Everybody  does,  some.  You  get  that  feel- 
ing in  June  for  a  day  or  two  at  least.  You  can't 
help  it.  A  good  many  of  the  men  who  had  en- 
tered with  me  had  flunked  out;  in  any  case,  I 
had  heard  a  great  deal  about  them,  for  the  man 
who  flunks  out  gets  an  exaggerated  amount  of 
attention.  It  reacts  on  the  feeling  of  pride  of 
those  who  have  the  good  luck  to  stay  in,  and,  of 
course,  I  had  some  of  it — that  is,  both  of  the 
luck  and  pride. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  was  so  pleased  that  for 
the  time  being  I  forgot  all  about  my  financial 
embarrassment.  The  thought  I  had  was  to  get 
away  from  books  and  just  have  a  lot  of  fun 
and  a  lot  of  physical  exercise.    Every  summer  I 

made  this  a  rule,  and  it  was  a  good  one.     Ordi- 

80 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      81 

narily,  I  didn't  crack  a  book — for  study.  Yes,  I 
did,  of  course,  read  for  pleasure. 

But  the  academic  year  was  not  yet  entirely 
over.  The  campus  was  in  holiday,  and  the  grave 
seniors — they  didn't  look  so  very  grave  to  me — 
possessed  the  place.  I  had  heard  that  they  had 
fine  times  at  commencement.  My  last  examina- 
tion fell  on  the  Friday  before  the  Yale  game,  and 
the  alumni  were  beginning  to  come  in  in  costumes. 
It  certainly  did  look  to  me  as  if  they  were  going 
to  have  a  good  time  for  sure,  and  if  there  was 
going  to  be  any  fun  I  wanted  to  see  it.  Fun  is 
cheap  around  college,  and  it's  the  one  thing  I 
always  felt  I  couldn't  afford  to  miss.  But  as  yet 
I  hadn't  had  any  of  what  we  call  Princeton  spirit, 
and  when  I  saw  all  the  men  in  costumes  parad- 
ing through  the  town  I  got  pretty  much  the  same 
impression  that  I  would  have  had  from  seeing  a 
circus  go  through  and  pull  off  its  stunts. 

But  in  the  evening,  out  in  front  of  Nassau  Hall, 
it  was  different.  I  had  dressed  for  a  holiday,  had 
dinner  at  commons,  which  was  now  quiet  and  half- 
deserted,  and  I  was  rested.  My  cares  were  gone, 
and  I  felt  free  and  at  large  in  the  world  for  the 


82     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

first  time  in  many  months,  and  as  I  sauntered 
over  to  the  campus  on  that  summer  evening,  in 
my  best  suit,  I  thought  as  I  looked  back  that  I 
was  pretty  lucky.  I  just  sat  there  for  a  couple 
of  hours  and  listened.  The  songs  of  the  older 
classes  appealed  to  me  particularly.  To  hear 
some  old  grad,  forty-five  or  fifty,  who  was  prob- 
ably the  leader  of  the  glee-club  in  his  day,  get  up 
and  sing  with  what  little  voice  he  had  left,  but 
with  all  his  pep — somehow  it  makes  a  fellow  feel 
queer.  I  began  to  think  there  was  something  in 
it,  after  all,  and  when  they  walked  around  the 
front  campus  in  the  soft  light  of  the  Japanese 
lanterns  I  began  to  have  a  more  sober  feeling 
about  Princeton  and  being  a  Princeton  man.  I 
began  to  think  that  that's  what  I  was. 

Staying  over  for  that  commencement  helped 
to  tie  me  to  the  place.  Early  in  the  next  week  I 
went  home.  I  might  add  that  I  hadn't  wasted 
my  time,  and  that  I  had  sold  programmes  at  the 
commencement  game. 

How  did  it  feel  to  be  home  again,  and  how 
did  they  treat  me?  They  had  gotten  into  the 
habit  of  treating  me,  on  my  return,  as  if  I  were 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      83 

the  prodigal  son,  and  as  I  never  saw  much  sense 
in  that  I  now  came  back  unannounced. 

Was  there  anything  special  about  this  return? 
No,  the  greatest  fuss  that  was  ever  made  over 
me  was  at  Thanksgiving  time  of  my  freshman 
year.  Why?  Because  we  had  won  the  football 
championship.  Everybody  treated  me  as  if  I 
were  a  member  of  the  team.  I  liked  it.  You 
haven't  any  idea  what  a  difference  a  successful 
football  season  makes  in  the  reception  a  fellow 
like  myself  gets  when  he  goes  home.  The  fact 
that  I  had  passed  all  my  studies  and  done  a  year's 
work  was  nothing  compared  to  the  fact  that  a 
lot  of  other  fellows  whom  I  didn't  even  know, 
and  who  didn't  belong  to  my  class,  had  won  foot- 
ball games  from  Yale  and  Harvard.  But  there's 
no  use  trying  to  be  philosophical  about  this;  I 
enjoyed  that  reception  they  gave  me  at  Thanks- 
giving time,  and  hope  that  next  year's  freshmen 
will  be  able  to  go  back  fo*r  Thanksgiving  under 
the  same  conditions.  I  suppose  it  is  generally 
true  all  the  way  around  that  parents  make  less 
and  less  fuss  about  the  return  of  college  prodigals 
the  longer  they  are  away  at  college.    They  come, 


84     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

just  as  my  people  did,  to  take  it  for  granted. 
I  was  away  at  college,  and  now  when  I  came 
back  the  folks  accepted  without  comment  the 
fact  that  I  was  home  and  that  I  would  return  to 
Princeton  again. 

Student  Farmers 

In  this  case  I  was  only  home  for  a  few  days, 
because,  as  you  will  remember,  I  had  made  my 
plans  in  that  interview  with  the  secretary  of  the 
Self-Help  Bureau  when  he  gave  me  a  place  for 
the  summer.  I  was  to  work  on  the  University 
Farm.  I  may  have  ability,  but  I'm  sure  that  I 
had  very  little  experience  as  a  farmer.  My  whole 
previous  training  consisted  in  one  day's  work, 
which  I  had  put  in  when  I  was  about  ten,  pick- 
ing beans  and  tomatoes.  For  that  day's  work  I 
had  earned  about  twenty  cents;  but  I  learned 
where  to  go  for  "free"  tomatoes  when  we  later 
went  swimming.  On  the  strength  of  that  you 
couldn't  really  call  me  a  finished  agriculturist. 
But  I  don't  want  you  to  imagine  that  that  farm 
proposition  was  a  dead  loss  to  the  university. 
I  know  some  people  smile  when  you  talk  about 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE     85 

"The  Farm."  I  want  to  say  right  here  that  to 
the  best  of  my  knowledge  and  belief  (and  I  ought 
to  know  something  about  it,  as  I  later  kept  the 
books)  that  farm  in  the  first  year  broke  even 
financially  and  was  later  making  money.  It 
acquired  a  good  deal  of  valuable  machinery  and 
had  several  hundred  dollars'  worth  of  cover 
crops  planted  for  the  following  year  when  it 
came  to  an  end.  Furthermore,  the  agricultural 
side  of  it  was  excellently  managed,  and  if  the 
farm  "petered  out"  it  was  not  because  the  scheme 
was  a  failure  but  because  the  stadium  was  built 
in  the  heart  of  it  and  most  of  the  rest  of  it  was 
needed  for  the  approaches  and  other  develop- 
ments about  the  stadium.  So,  if  anybody  wants 
to  laugh  about  chimerical  schemes,  he'll  have  to 
find  something  else  to  laugh  about  besides  this 
project  of  student  farming. 

There  were,  to  be  sure,  a  number  of  things 
about  the  farm  in  the  first  year  that  were  amus- 
ing. In  the  first  place,  a  farmer  is  supposed  to 
get  up  at  four  and  work  till  moonrise.  We 
didn't.  We  worked  eight  hours  a  day  at  twenty- 
five  cents  per  hour,  then  played  tennis  and  took 


86     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

a  shower.  I  call  that  office  work  and  banking 
hours.  Furthermore,  things  were  not  yet  under 
way,  and  work  not  only  had  to  be  done  but  had 
to  be  manufactured;  that  is,  the  boss  had  to  sit 
up  nights  to  think  out  things  for  us  to  do.  You 
couldn't  work  any  more  than  eight  hours  if  you 
wanted  to.  In  other  words,  you  were  limited  to 
forty-eight  hours  a  week.  You  could,  however 
(at  least  one  of  my  friends  and  myself  did),  work 
twelve  hours  a  day  for  four  days  and  earn  a  three 
days'  vacation.  My  friend  felt  it  was  a  shame 
to  take  the  money,  and  decided  he  would  relieve 
the  university  of  one  man's  time  and  take  a  job 
in  New  York;  so  we  decided  we'd  make  the  trip 
to  the  great  city  in  a  canoe  on  one  of  our  three 
days'  recesses. 

Down  to  the  Sea  in  Ships 

It  was  one  of  the  adventures  of  the  summer 
that  I  remember  with  a  good  deal  of  pleasure 
— as  I  look  back  on  it.  We  started  off  Friday 
afternoon  and  slept  that  night  somewhere  near 
New  Brunswick,  under  the  canoe,  "On  the  Banks 
of   the   Old  Raritan."    So   far,   so   good.     Our 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      87 

troubles  came  the  next  day.  And,  I'll  tell  you, 
farmers  have  no  right  to  go  down  to  the  sea  in 
ships. 

There  was  evidently  going  to  be  a  storm,  but 
we  didn't  know  it.  Just  before  we  got  down  to 
Newark  Bay  we  began  to  attract  some  attention 
in  our  seventy-five-pound  craft,  and  drew  up 
alongside  a  barge  for  water.  We  figured  that  to 
reach  our  destination  we  still  had  to  go  through 
Newark  Bay,  Kill  von  Kull,  and  then  across  five 
miles  of  the  open  water  of  upper  New  York  Bay 
to  get  to  Gowanus  Canal.  While  we  were  getting 
our  drink  the  old  salt  on  the  barge  looked  us  over 
and  said: 

"Where  be  ye  goin',  mates?" 

"  Gowanus  Canal,"  we  answered  innocently. 

"In  that  sloop?"  he  said. 

"Yes." 

He  looked  us  over  again  from  head  to  foot, 
looked  at  our  canoe,  looked  at  the  sky,  turned 
his  back,  and  walked  into  his  cabin  scratching 
his  head  but  never  saying  a  word.  We  realized 
later  that  his  silence  was  more  eloquent  than 
speech  could  have  been,  for  when  we  arrived  in 


88     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

New  York  Bay  the  waves  were  so  high  that  as 
we  tumbled  into  the  troughs  I  could  barely  see 
the  upper  decks  of  the  large  Staten  Island  ferry- 
boats that  were  crossing  in  front  of  us. 

The  fact  that  I  am  telling  you  this  story  proves 
that  we  got  there — but  I  don't  know  how,  and 
we  didn't  deserve  to.  My  friend  stayed  in  New 
York  and  I  came  back  by  train  to  my  more  pro- 
saic labors. 

Tilling  the  soil  may  not  be  exciting,  but  we 
had  a  glorious  time.  I  don't  mean  financially, 
but  socially,  because,  even  though  we  did  get 
our  rooms,  we  had  to  pay  board,  and  there  was 
not  a  great  deal  left  on  Saturday  night.  I  did, 
however,  manage  to  do  pretty  well,  for  I  got  a 
few  incidental  jobs,  one  of  them  carrying  mail, 
and  I  came  back  to  college  in  mighty  fine  shape 
and  with  a  determination  to  make  a  second  group. 

All  told,  things  looked  pretty  favorable  now. 
During  the  summer  I  had  met  a  man  who  prom- 
ised me  that  I  could  get  work  enough  at  the  com- 
mons to  pay  all  my  board.  This  would  relieve 
me  of  five  dollars  and  fifty  cents  a  week,  and  I 
began  to  imagine  that  being  a  sophomore  would 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      89 

be  one  long  dream.  It  wasn't.  It  was  a  night- 
mare. When  things  are  coming  your  way  you 
can't  stop  them,  but  when  they  are  going  against 
you,  you  can't  stop  them  either,  and  in  my  sopho- 
more year,  at  the  beginning  especially,  they  cer- 
tainly went  against  me  hard. 

Back  on  the  Campus 

The  summer's  work  was  done  and  I  was  on 
the  campus  once  more.  A  new  crop  of  freshmen 
were  here,  and  the  everlasting  round  was  begin- 
ning again.  I  am  not  ashamed  to  say  that  I 
was  feeling  my  sophomoric  oats,  and  I  hazed 
one  presumptuous-looking  freshman  just  to  get 
an  objective  view  of  how  foolish  I  must  have 
looked  when  they  did  it  to  me.  But,  honestly,  I 
had  very  little  stomach  for  it,  and  I  think  a  good 
deal  of  it  is  nonsense  and  some  of  it  vicious — and 
for  this  reason:  as  a  general  thing  they  horse  the 
men  who  need  it  least  and  they  let  off  the  bump- 
tious freshman  who  comes  from  a  big,  well-known 
prep  school,  or  the  promising  athlete  who  has 
friends  to  get  him  out  of  it;  whereas,  when  a  fel- 
low comes,  in  all  humility,  from  some  little  corner 


9o     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

and  feels  low  in  his  mind,  and  makes  absolutely 
no  pretensions,  he  ordinarily  is  the  man  who  gets 
it  worst;  and  he  has  no  friends  to  call  off  the 
terrorizing  sophs.  And  what  little  courage  he 
has  is  knocked  out  of  him  for  months — and 
sometimes  years. 

But,  on  the  whole,  even  though  I  tried  to 
down  it,  I  felt  that  I  had  a  pretty  large  claim  on 
the  world  and  a  pretty  tight  mortgage  on  the 
sophomore  year.  But  things  began  to  break 
pretty  badly. 

The  Last  Straw 

You  will  remember  that  I  had  a  debt  of  one 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  to  pay  for  money 
borrowed.  I  had  gotten  this  off  by  incurring 
other  debts,  but  it  left  me  far  down  in  the 
world,  and,  financially  speaking,  my  head  was 
under  water.  Still,  the  commons  had  started 
and  I  was  to  be  able  to  earn  my  board.  I 
went  up  to  see  about  my  prospective  work 
and  found  that  this  was  a  mistake,  or  that 
in  any  case  the  promise  which  had  been  made 
me  by  a  student,  whom  I  had  believed  to  be  in 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      91 

authority,  could  not  be  kept.  I  could  work  off 
only  part  of  my  commons  bill,  and  would  have 
to  pay  three  dollars  a  week !  That  meant  for  the 
year  an  expense  of  one  hundred  and  eight  dol- 
lars which  I  had  not  counted  upon.  In  addition, 
as  you  have  seen,  I  was  already  in  debt.  It  meant, 
all  told,  an  initial  deficit  of  about  two  hundred 
and  fifty  dollars.  There  was  worse  to  come. 
You  will  remember  that  my  job  with  the  Press- 
ing Establishment  had  been  my  consolation  in 
the  dark  days  of  freshman  year.  This  now  was 
lost  to  me.  I  learned  that  this  was  only  a  job  for 
freshmen,  and  I  couldn't  have  it.  I  shall  have 
more  to  say  about  this  later,  and  about  the  com- 
plicated machinery  of  undergraduate  business, 
but  for  the  present  it  is  sufficient  to  know  that 
my  job  was  gone. 

There  were  even  worse  breakers  ahead.  In 
my  freshman  year  I  had  been  granted  a  remission 
of  one  hundred  dollars  on  my  tuition,  for  I  had 
entered  on  conditions  and  had  passed  them  off. 
Now,  our  marking  system  divides  the  students 
who  pass  into  five  groups.  Group  1  is,  of  course, 
the  highest,  but  groups  2  and  3  are  still  considered 


92     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

as  belonging  to  the  good-student  class.  To  get 
remission  as  a  sophomore  I  had  to  have  a  grade 
of  at  least  3.20.  I  had  finished  freshman  year 
with  an  average  .02  of  a  point  below  this  (3.22) 
and  had  foolishly  believed  that  this  would  be 
sufficient.  College  had  been  open  about  a  week 
and  as  yet  I  had  no  job.  I  thought  I  might  as 
well  have  this  matter  of  my  tuition  settled,  and 
to  do  so  I  had  to  see  one  of  the  university  author- 
ities. This  official,  as  I  have  learned  to  know  him 
since,  is  a  splendid  man  personally.  He  has  a 
heart  as  big  as  his  head,  but  it  seemed  to  me 
then  that  he  did  not  understand  the  psychology 
of  men  like  myself.  At  least  on  that  occasion  I 
failed  to  make  him  understand  me.  I  had  just 
been  told  about  my  fiasco  at  the  commons.  I 
was  not  cheerful,  and  I  never  have  been  any  good 
at  smoothness. 

My  story  certainly  was  a  hard-luck  tale,  and 
on  the  face  of  it  it  looked  fishy.  I  don't  blame 
him  now  for  having  been  suspicious.  I  shot  him 
a  perfectly  straight  story,  but  one  that  would 
have  made  the  Count  of  Monte  Cristo  look  like 
thirty  cents.    He  looked  at  me  as  if  I  were  giv- 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      93 

ing  him  panhandling  dope.  Excuse  the  phrase, 
but  that's  exactly  what  I  mean.  I  spoke  to  him 
about  remission  and  explained  to  him  the  situa- 
tion. He  said,  and  he  was  perfectly  right  as  I 
see  it  now,  that  he  had  to  draw  the  line  some- 
where, and  I  was  .02  of  a  point  below  the  line. 
That  seemed  to  me  a  hard  margin  to  lose  on. 

He  could  not  give  me  remission  then,  but,  by 
way  of  consolation,  told  me  that  in  case  I  made  a 
third  group  the  first  term  he  would  grant  me  the 
remission  for  the  year,  but  for  the  present  could 
do  nothing.  I  was  in  present  trouble  and  this 
thin  prospect  of  future  consolation  did  not  con- 
sole. I  likewise  brought  up  the  matter  of  my 
unfortunate  status  at  commons.  He  had  the 
power  to  help  me  out.  I  wasn't  brought  up  in  a 
parlor  and  I'm  afraid  my  manner  lacked  finish. 
In  any  case,  I  didn't  impress,  I  only  depressed 
him.  Now,  a  poor  man  is  proud  not  of  the  fact 
that  he  hasn't  anything,  but  because  he  hasn't. 
My  pride  was  all  that  I  had  left,  and  when  you're 
in  that  state  it  is  very  easily  hurt.  I  didn't  want 
anything  that  didn't  belong  to  me,  I  wasn't 
clamoring  for  my  pound  of  flesh,  but  he  was  busy 


94     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

and  broke  in  on  my  story,  saying  that  a  man  who 
can't  pay  three  dollars  a  week  for  board  doesn't 
belong  in  college,  and  concluded  with:  "This 
isn't  a  charitable  institution."  That  was  the  last 
straw,  and  it  was  the  hardest  knock.  It  was  the 
one  thing  that  made  me  bitter. 

I  understand  it  now,  and  you  must  know  that 
I  hold  nothing  against  him,  and  he,  who  has  many 
such  cases  to  decide,  probably  never  thought  about 
it  again.  But  absolutely  and  without  exception 
that  was  the  blackest  moment  in  my  college  ca- 
reer. The  idea  that  people  could  imagine  that  I 
was  looking  for  charity  knocked  my  legs  out  from 
under  me.  I  cut  my  classes  for  three  or  four 
days  straight,  brooded  about  the  whole  business, 
and  decided  that  I  was  through  with  this  place. 
I  walked  over  to  the  Self-Help  Bureau  and  asked 
the  secretary  what  job  he  could  get  for  a  man 
outside. 

It  so  happened  that  at  just  this  time  he  had 
been  asked  to  provide  a  man  as  companion  to 
an  invalid  who  was  going  to  Florida.  That 
sounded  good  to  me,  partly  because  it  was  far 
away,  and  I  made  up  my  mind  I  would  take  that 


THE  GAY  YOUNG  SOPHOMORE      95 

job.    The  secretary  was  to  give  me  the  details 
that  afternoon. 

I  packed  my  grip  and  returned  a  few  hours 
later  prepared  to  go  to  Florida,  but  for  once  in 
my  life  luck  was  with  me — the  job  was  gone. 


CHAPTER  VI 
ON    THE    DEFENSIVE 

I  say  that  I  lost  that  Florida  job,  and  was 
sorry.  I  really  didn't  know  what  to  do  next.  I 
went  out  and  walked  my  legs  off.  It's  always  a 
relief  to  get  dead  tired,  and  the  next  morning 
when  I  awoke  I  made  up  my  mind  that  I'd  stay 
here  out  of  spite;  I'd  run  up  a  bill,  and  if  I  couldn't 
pay  it  they'd  have  to  throw  me  out.  It  was  the 
only  time  that  I  ever  felt  this  way  in  my  life. 
All  told,  it  was  the  darkest  hour  in  my  four 
years.  Well,  one  thing  helped;  I  now  had  some 
friends,  and  when  I  say  friend  I  mean  a  fellow 
who  will  stick. 

After  a  few  days  I'd  pulled  myself  out  of  the 
dumps.  I  knew  I  had  lost  the  pressing  work, 
and  I  had  to  find  something  to  do.  You  will 
remember  I  had  been  on  the  farm  during  the 
summer,  and  during  the  fall  there  was  a  certain 

amount  of  bookkeeping  and  an  occasional  day's 

96 


ON  THE  DEFENSIVE  97 

work  at  gathering  crops.  But  so  far  this  was  all 
that  was  in  sight.  I  saw  that  I  had  to  start  out 
on  my  own  responsibility,  and,  instead  of  going 
to  hunt  up  the  work  that  was  lying  around  loose, 
I  decided,  now  that  I  knew  more  about  college 
life  and  customs,  to  go  out  and  manufacture  the 
work.  My  first  scheme  in  this  line  (and  it  was 
to  be  the  first  of  many)  I  entered  upon  with 
another  fellow,  and  it  proved  a  failure.  It  was 
a  scheme  for  selling  to  the  freshmen  black  caps 
and  jerseys.  There  was  nothing  wrong  with  the 
scheme  intrinsically  except  that  by  the  time  we 
really  got  started  all  the  freshmen  had  their  caps 
and  jerseys.  For  a  week's  hard  work  we  cashed 
in  three  dollars  and  fifty  cents  apiece  and  the 
scheme  was  dead. 

Off  to  a  Poor  Start 

I  didn't  really  relish  the  idea  of  being  advised 
to  leave  for  non-payment  of  bills.  That  was  only 
a  momentary  back-fire,  and  I  made  up  my  mind 
I  was  going  to  start  in  and  get  off  this  load  that 
was  hanging  over  me.  Henry  James  says  that 
the  hero  of  Balzac's  " Human  Comedy"  is  the 


98     COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

twenty-franc  piece.  Now,  the  hero  of  my  sopho- 
more year  was  the  dollar  bill,  and  for  the  first 
part  of  the  year  especially  my  story  revolves 
around  the  money  question.  You  can  see  why. 
If  in  addition  to  the  two  hundred  and  fifty  dol- 
lars, of  which  I  have  already  spoken,  I  failed  to 
get  remission  of  tuition,  it  would  add  another  one 
hundred  dollars  to  my  year's  expenses  at  the 
start,  to  say  nothing  of  room-rent,  heat  and  light, 
and  the  other  items  which  would  be  included  in 
the  term  bill  which  was  now  due.  I  had  to  try 
to  move  that  mountain,  and  I  went  after  it. 

Among  other  things  that  I  took  up  was  the 
delivering  of  papers,  an  hour  in  the  morning  and 
an  hour  in  the  evening.  I  likewise  decided  to 
cash  in  some  of  my  previous  year's  experience  and 
therefore  went  out  scouting  to  find  more  furnaces 
to  conquer.  All  told,  I  found  four  of  them — that 
the  owners  were  willing  to  intrust  to  me — and 
this  year  I  dare  say  I  did  better.  Nothing  suc- 
ceeds like  failure,  and  I  had  certainly  been  a 
pretty  good  failure  in  my  early  weeks  at  that  other 
furnace.  In  addition  to  these  furnaces  I  found 
employment  in  an  artist's  studio.    No,  you're 


ON  THE  DEFENSIVE  99 

joking,  I  wasn't  a  model.  My  face  wouldn't  let 
me  do  that;  no  such  soft  stuff  was  ever  to  come 
my  way — I  had  to  work  for  mine,  but  it  was 
easy  work.  I  was  only  handy  boy  around  the 
studio — or  tried  to  be — cleaned  pictures,  washed 
brushes,  mowed  the  lawn  in  the  early  fall  and 
spring,  shined  shoes,  and  did  general  janitor  work. 
Did  I  mind?  No.  The  artist  was  a  splendid  fel- 
low, and  made  it  as  easy  for  me  as  he  could.  All 
this  helped  to  make  a  start. 

The  Students'  Distributing  Agency 

Necessity  is  the  mother  of  invention,  and  I  was 
under  the  necessity  of  getting  my  bills  paid  and 
proving  that  I  was  not  a  charity  patient,  so  I 
decided  I  would  have  to  invent — promote,  I  sup- 
pose you'd  say — and  I  soon  became  interested 
in  two  schemes,  the  first  of  which  started  on  the 
suggestion  of  one  of  my  very  good  friends  who 
was  to  be  my  partner  in  this  work  for  the  rest  of 
my  college  course.  The  scheme  had  originated 
something  like  this:  We  had  noticed  that  monthly 
statements  from  the  university  store  were  deliv- 
ered at  the  students'  rooms  by  students.     Evi- 


ioo    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

dently  this  saved  postage.  Why  couldn't  the 
business  men  in  town  have  their  monthly  student 
bills  delivered  in  the  same  way?  Instead  of  pay- 
ing two  cents  for  postage,  they  would  pay  us  one 
cent  a  bill  and  save  one  cent.  If  we  could  get 
them  to  do  this  it  would  be  to  their  advantage  as 
well  as  to  ours.  The  whole  thing  lay  in  getting 
it  started  right  and  in  having  some  reliable  mer- 
chant or  business  man  give  us  his  confidence. 

This  was  no  easy  matter,  but  after  a  number 
of  interviews,  with  the  help  of  the  secretary  of 
the  bureau,  the  man  we  wanted  decided  to  give 
us  a  try. 

The  rest  was  easy,  and  we  soon  had  started 
The  Students'  Distributing  Agency,  and  distrib- 
uted on  the  college  grounds  and  to  the  students 
in  town,  at  the  seminary,  and  to  the  graduate  stu- 
dents the  monthly  statements  of  two  laundries, 
two  restaurants,  three  drug-stores  and  soda-foun- 
tains, one  furnishing  house,  and  a  telegraph  office. 
In  addition  we  took  over  a  certain  amount  of 
what  would  now  be  called  parcel-post  business, 
which  we  later  lost  to  the  government.  No,  I 
bear  no  grudges.     They  do  it  about  as  well  as 


ON  THE  DEFENSIVE  101 

we  did.  The  only  difference  is  that  we  didn't 
lose  money  or  get  into  a  fuss  with  the  railroads. 

Evidently  we  had  struck  something  good  and 
we  started  to  develop  and  expand  the  business. 
If  we  distributed  statements,  why  not  distribute 
circulars  also  and  branch  out  into  advertising? 
We  decided  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to  persuade 
various  establishments  in  and  out  of  town  to  get 
their  names  prominently  before  the  students  by 
giving  them  some  little  souvenir  and  having  us 
distribute  it.  We  suggested  something  useful,  a 
blotter,  for  instance,  with  their  name  and  compli- 
ments, and  they  took  up  with  it.  Soon  we  were 
distributing  blotters  from  several  merchants  in 
town,  from  a  New  York  hotel,  two  fountain- 
pen  manufacturers,  a  shoe-house,  a  tailor,  and  a 
barber.  We  worked  the  scheme  until  the  boys 
held  up  their  hands  when  they  saw  us  coming, 
and  for  a  time  I  must  confess  it  did  certainly  rain 
blotters. 

We  saw  we  had  reached  the  stage  of  diminish- 
ing returns;  blotters  were  no  longer  welcome,  and 
we  began  timidly  to  suggest  celluloid  rulers,  in- 
expensive hat-cleaners,  etc.    In  addition  we  dis- 


io2    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

tributed  booklets  and  advertising  circulars  and 
samples  of  one  sort  and  another.  In  this  way  I 
got  to  know  every  short  cut  in  the  dormitories, 
and,  after  having  systematized  the  work,  found 
that  I  could  make  a  complete  delivery  in  about 
two  and  a  half  hours.  It  saved  money  for  them 
and  it  brought  money  to  us,  and  we  have  stayed 
with  and  developed  that  business  up  to  the  pres- 
ent, until  I  suppose  now  it  has  become  a  college 
custom. 

Now,  there  is  one  thing  to  be  remembered 
about  a  new  college  enterprise.  There  is  no  pat- 
ent or  exclusive  franchise,  and  if  you  start  some- 
thing of  this  sort  that  is  new  and  begins  to  be 
good,  and  noise  it  around,  a  number  of  other  fel- 
lows immediately  go  and  do  likewise  and  swamp 
your  scheme.  So  we  kept  it  dark  until  we  had 
completely  developed  the  system  and  were  sure 
that  an  announcement  of  our  advanced  status 
and  practical  monopoly  would  bring  us  more 
business  and  tend  to  discourage  imitation. 


ON  THE  DEFENSIVE  103 

"You've  Got  to  Hop  Some" 

But  the  Distributing  Agency  did  not  spring  up 
in  a  single  night;  it  was  the  work  of  many  months, 
and  as  yet  was  in  its  infancy.  In  the  meantime 
the  Yale  game  was  coming  along,  and,  as  the  last 
year's  circulation  manager  for  the  programmes 
had  been  graduated,  I  decided  to  apply  for  his 
place.  I  got  it,  and  it  was  to  lead  to  better 
things  later  on. 

But  don't  imagine  that  I  was  living  on  Easy 
Street.  It's  a  hard  little  world  and  you've  got  to 
hop  some  to  beat  the  other  fellow  to  it.  Every 
once  in  so  often  a  notice  would  come  from  the 
treasurer,  and  I  had  made  up  my  mind  I  was 
going  to  cut  down  that  bill. 

You  will  remember  that  we  had  lost  out  on  the 
scheme  for  selling  freshmen  caps  and  jerseys  be- 
cause some  one  else  had  been  too  quick  for  us. 
I  decided  to  go  in  on  another  scheme  and  to  get 
in  earlier,  and  on  the  ground  floor.  It  was  after 
Christmas,  and,  as  you  know,  the  freshman  is  not 
allowed  to  wear  a  yellow  slicker.  He  wears  the 
black  rubber  coat.    But  I  thought  it  would  be  a 


io4    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

good  time  to  begin  to  take  orders  for  the  next 
September,  when  they  would  be  sophomores;  and 
of  course  every  sophomore  wears  a  yellow  slicker 
just  because  he  couldn't  wear  one  as  a  freshman. 
It's  the  badge  of  all  his  tribe.  There  is  a  good 
profit  to  be  made  on  slickers  if  you  can  buy  them 
wholesale.  We  decided  to  get  a  somewhat  better 
slicker  than  usual  and  sell  it  for  a  little  less,  and 
started  around  to  take  orders. 

Now,  ordinarily  you  can't  find  men  in  their 
rooms  before  8.30  p.  m.  Dinner  and  the  movies, 
about  the  only  form  of  amusement  off  the  cam- 
pus, keep  them  until  that  time.  Yes,  the  moving- 
picture  show  is  now  a  recognized  part  of  every 
student's  education.  We  went  at  our  work 
every  night  from  8.30  until  10.30  or  11.  The 
whole  scheme  depended  upon  how  we  handled 
the  freshmen.  They  follow  each  other  like  sheep, 
and  if  you  can  get  one  in  a  crowd  you  can  get 
them  all.  We  worked  hard  on  this  scheme,  and 
the  next  fall  when  the  slickers  were  delivered  we 
had  cleared  one  hundred  dollars. 

Yes,  it  was  a  good  deal  of  work,  and  it  kept 
me  pretty  busy,  and  there  is  only  one  other  oc- 


ON  THE  DEFENSIVE  105 

cupation  that  I  need  mention  for  the  present. 
In  the  spring  and  fall  I  ran  the  traps  for  the  gun 
club,  and  of  course  in  the  spring  I  again  took 
charge  of  the  distribution  of  the  programmes  at 
the  games. 

This  was  by  far  the  hardest  work  that  I  have 
done  during  my  college  career.  But  things  were 
humming,  and  I  like  to  hear  them  hum,  so  I 
wasn't  gloomy.  I  didn't  have  time  for  that. 
The  work  was  interesting  and  not  monotonous, 
and  I  got  a  lot  of  fun  out  of  it,  laughing  with  the 
crowd,  or  at  them,  or  having  them  laugh  at  me. 

A  Typical  Day 

How  did  I  manage  to  crowd  it  all  into  one 
day?  There  wasn't  any  crowding;  I  was  forced 
to  reduce  it  to  a  system,  and  everything  fitted  in 
nicely.  Yes,  I  can  give  you  specimen  days  from 
my  diary.  Through  the  winter  I  got  up  at  about 
5,  studied,  and  went  out  to  take  care  of  the 
furnaces — at  one  place,  you  will  remember,  I 
shined  shoes  and  carried  the  coal,  etc.;  returned 
home  at  7  or  7.05,  took  a  shower  and  changed 
clothes,  and  was  at  the  commons  for  breakfast 


io6    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

at  7.30,  for  I  still  worked  at  the  commons;  took 
charge  of  the  stand  for  about  an  hour  a  day. 
Went  to  three  classes  in  the  morning;  had  lunch; 
in  the  afternoon  put  in  two  hours  at  the  studio; 
would  ride  down  on  my  wheel  to  the  farm  and 
take  charge  of  the  books  for  an  hour  and  a  half 
or  two  hours;  came  back  for  dinner;  fixed  up  the 
furnaces  for  the  night,  which  took  about  an  hour; 
went  home  and  studied  a  bit;  and  when  there  was 
distributing  to  do,  did  that,  and  when  there  was 
no  distributing,  went  out  canvassing  for  slickers. 
I  got  home  between  10  and  n,  studied  for  a 
while,  and  was  up  again  between  4  and  5.30,  ac- 
cording to  the  number  of  classes  I  had  to  prepare 
for  that  day.  I  did  most  of  my  studying  in  the 
early  morning,  while  I  was  feeling  fresh  and  when 
my  time  was  uninterrupted.  I  think  some  wise 
old  boy  has  said:  "Six  hours'  sleep  for  a  man, 
seven  for  a  woman,  eight  for  a  fool.,,  I  got  a 
man's  sleep  in  those  days,  though  now  I  take  the 
eight — but  then  you  know  I'm  a  senior. 

Did  I  find  it  hard  to  get  recreation?  No,  not 
at  all.  It's  a  curious  fact,  but  it's  true,  that  the 
busier  I  was,  and  the  more  I  had  to  do,  the  more 


ON  THE  DEFENSIVE  107 

time  I  seemed  to  get  for  things  outside  and  the 
more  I  enjoyed  them.  Some  of  the  keenest  mo- 
ments of  enjoyment  that  I  ever  remember  having 
had  were  the  little  intervals  of  rest  between  two 
jobs  when  I  came  back  to  my  room.  Situated  as 
it  was,  it  was  a  kind  of  meeting-place,  and  after 
sitting  and  fooling  with  my  classmates  for  a 
quarter  of  an  hour  or  so  I  went  off  again  feeling 
mighty  cheerful. 

In  that  schedule  I  am  not  counting  the  times 
I  found  to  go  down  to  the  gym — and  I  did  go 
down  fairly  often,  except  in  the  spring,  when  I 
played  baseball — lectures,  recitals,  concerts,  and 
the  time  I  spent  talking  with  the  fellows  in  my 
room  or  in  theirs,  and  now  and  then  playing  a 
game  of  chess.  I'm  glad  to  say,  however,  that  I 
didn't  have  to  work  at  that  pace  my  next  two 
years. 

When  did  I  get  my  fob  ?  Oh,  I'm  very  proud 
of  that.  It  was  given  me  for  being  a  member  of 
the  championship  baseball  team  of  my  class  in 
that  year. 


CHAPTER  VII 
WITH  COMPLIMENTS  TO  PADDY 

My  year's  work  looks  more  discouraging  to  you 
than  it  did  to  me.  You  must  set  it  up  against 
my  previous  experiences;  and  I  see  I  must  give 
you  my  points  of  comparison,  and  especially  one 
comparison  which  I  made  very  frequently  to 
myself  and  which  gave  me  a  good  deal  of  com- 
fort. All  I  had  to  do  to  shake  off  the  blues  was 
to  say  to  myself:  " Remember  339."  I  thought 
I'd  explained  that?    Well,  it  was  like  this. 

You  remember  that  as  a  youngster  I  had 
usually  kept  in  pretty  good  trim  and  got  a  fair 
amount  of  physical  exercise.  But  while  at  high 
school,  during  term  time,  what  I  did  was  mostly 
in  the  way  of  collecting — light  work,  you  might 
call  it — so  that  as  a  result  I  was  somewhat  soft 
and  out  of  training  in  the  summer.  When 
I  was   sixteen  I  was   looking  for  steady  work, 

and  finally  joined  a  gang  with  pick  and  shovel. 

108 


WITH  COMPLIMENTS  TO  PADDY     109 

Like  a  convict,  I  lost  my  name  and  became  a 
number.  I  was  "339."  I  stood  down  in  the  ditch 
with  a  lot  of  dagos.  Above  stood  a  burly  Irish- 
man with  a  black,  half-eaten  clay  pipe  in  his  face. 
He  was  so  expert  with  that  pipe  that  he  could 
swear  without  removing  or  holding  it.  That  was 
his  business — I  mean  swearing  at  us.  It  was  his 
idea  of  encouragement,  and  gave  him  a  good  deal 
of  private  satisfaction  besides.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  his  cussing  didn't  really  do  any  harm,  be- 
cause I  was  about  the  only  man  in  the  gang  who 
understood  his  lingo. 

I  always  remembered  my  experiences,  especially 
my  first  morning  there,  and  it  will  serve  as  a 
" point  of  comparison."  It  was  broiling  hot  and 
we  were  sizzling  in  the  sun.  My  arms  were  sore 
and  my  back  stiff  as  a  board.  I  had  worked  for 
what  seemed  half  a  day  and  was  pricking  up  my 
ears  for  the  whistle.  After  digging  for  what 
seemed  another  long  hour,  I  turned  to  the  Italian 
next  me  and  finally  made  him  understand  that  I 
wanted  to  know  what  time  it  was.  He  leans  his 
shovel  against  him,  pulls  up  two  shirts,  pulls  out 
a  watch  like  a  clock,  and  says:  "Hava  pasta 


no    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

nine!"  I  don't  see  how  it  ever  struck  twelve 
that  day.  I  honestly  thought  it  never  would. 
That  summer  I  stood  in  the  ditch  with  a  row  of 
Italians,  to  whom  I  couldn't  talk,  bending  over 
my  pick  and  shovel  "from  morn  to  dewy  eve," 
though  I  confess  I  had  no  time  to  think  whether 
the  eve  was  "dewy"  or  not. 

More  Work  than  Poetry 

By  the  way,  while  we're  talking  Milton,  I  re- 
member one  of  my  preceptors  was  discussing  the 
question  of  what  is  poetry  with  a  group  of  us  one 
day,  and  brought  up  the  lines: 

"Now  came  still  evening  on,  and  twilight  gray 
Had  in  her  sober  livery  all  things  clad," 

and  was  asking  us  why  this  was  good  poetry. 
They  say  the  masses  don't  appreciate  poetry,  and 
I  like  to  think  that  I  belong  to  the  masses.  Those 
lines  are  beautiful  to  me  now,  but  they  can  be 
poetry  only  to  the  man  who  is  free  from  care 
and  has  time  to  let  his  thoughts  wander  to  things 
outside.  It's  nothing  to  feel  highbrow  about — 
any  laborer  has  the  same  innate  capacity — but 


WITH  COMPLIMENTS  TO  PADDY     in 

you  can't  expect  the  man  who  has  worked  with 
the  hoe  or  with  pick  and  shovel  all  day  to  appre- 
ciate lines  like  that.  He  is  tired  and  hungry, 
wants  to  eat  and  sleep,  and  his  thoughts  are 
centred  on  his  own  bodily  needs.  Well,  there 
was  no  poetry  about  that  work  of  mine.  I  was 
earning  my  dollar  and  a  half  (toward  the  end, 
two  dollars)  for  ten  hours'  work,  and  that's 
all  there  was  to  it.  I  carried  my  dinner,  about 
eight  sandwiches  and  a  bottle  of  milk  or  two 
bottles  of  beer,  and  ate  it  on  the  edge  of  the 
ditch  as  Number  339  of  the  section  gang.  It 
was  the  same  thing  from  morning  to  night;  the 
only  variety  or  possible  change  in  "the  day's 
occupation"  came  when  the  Irish  boss  had  dis- 
covered a  new  cuss  word.  He  spent  his  time 
between  oaths  in  thinking  up  new  ones,  and,  like 
most  Irishmen,  he  was  imaginative  and  fluent. 
He  let  me  know  that  I  was  working  for  him  and 
that  I  was  his  man,  and,  like  most  of  his  class, 
after  he  had  been  told  by  my  brother  that  I  was 
in  the  high  school,  he  felt  a  dumb  resentment  at 
the  fact  of  my  having  more  "education"  than  the 
boss  and  rubbed  it  in  on  every  occasion.    I  say 


ii2    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

there  was  no  variety  in  my  work  as  339  of  the 
wop  gang.    That's  a  slight  misstatement. 

For  a  time  some  of  us  were  detailed  to  unload 
one-hundred-pound  sewer-pipes,  and  since  now 
and  then,  when  Paddy's  oaths  got  monotonous,  or 
he  had  discovered  some  really  offensive  phrase,  I 
told  him  in  language  that  he  could  understand 
to  cut  it  out,  he  picked  me  for  this  job.  I  wasn't 
going  to  let  him  bluff  me.  He  wanted  the  satis- 
faction of  seeing  me  cave  in,  and  I  wasn't  going 
to  give  it  to  him.  We  lock-stepped  with  those 
pipes  on  our  shoulders,  and  I  tell  you  mine  were 
peeled  and  raw  as  a  beefsteak  from  my  neck  to 
my  arm.  I  carried  them  from  the  car  to  the 
ditch  all  day  to  an  obligato  of  Irish  oaths  and 
"Hur-r-ry  up,  smairty;  get  a  move  on  ye,  ye 

,"  with  now  and  then  a  choicer  bar.     As 

I  was  carrying  those  pipes  I  said  to  myself:  "My 
boy,  that's  all  you're  fitted  for  or  you  wouldn't 
be  here."  So  I  made  up  my  mind  that  I  wasn't 
going  to  stay  and  left  Paddy  without  much 
hand-shaking. 

Well,  that's  what  life  had  been  like,  on  oc- 
casions, before  I  came  to  college.    The  conditions 


WITH  COMPLIMENTS  TO  PADDY     113 

under  which  I  worked  now  made  work  seem 
play.  Everybody  had  a  smile  or  a  cheerful  word. 
None  of  the  boys  ever  treated  me  with  anything 
but  respect  because  I  earned  my  way,  and  all 
gave  me  help  and  encouragement.  There  was  no 
distinction.  The  finest  thing  about  it  was  the 
fact  that  there  was  no  snobbish  condescension. 
We  were  all  on  the  same  footing.  I  wasn't  working 
for  them;   I  was  only  one  of  them  who  worked. 

So,  on  days  when  hours  seemed  long  or  work 
ran  harder  than  usual,  I  used  to  remind  myself 
of  that  fluent  Irishman  and  339  and  forget  about 
it.  Compared  to  my  time  with  the  gang,  my 
hardest  day  in  college  was  pretty  much  paradise. 

Yes,  I  would  have  broken  even  with  the  treas- 
urer, but  in  the  course  of  the  year  certain  obli- 
gations had  fallen  to  my  share;  still,  at  the  end 
of  the  session  I  owed  him  only  a  small  amount, 
which  I  felt  could  be  paid  up  before  the  opening 
of  college  in  September. 

An  Old  Partner  of  Mine 

But  before  I  dismiss  this  matter  I  want  to  say 
a  word  about  my  partner  in  the  Agency,  be- 


ii4    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

cause  he  is  one  of  the  most  interesting  and  finest 
types  of  college  man,  and  he  stands  out  pretty 
well  against  my  older  acquaintance,  Paddy. 
He  is  one  of  the  most  unselfish  and  altru- 
istic fellows  it  has  ever  been  my  good  fortune 
to  know;  a  hard  worker,  but  he  doesn't  talk 
about  his  work — his  work  talks  for  him.  He 
is  a  Phi  Beta  Kappa  man,  but  he  doesn't  live 
in  his  books  alone.  For  three  years  he  has  run 
the  launch  for  the  Varsity  crews — out  of  college 
spirit;  he  is  business  manager  of  two  of  the  most 
important  undergraduate  publications,  just  be- 
cause he  doesn't  want  to  loaf;  he  takes  a  leading 
part  in  every  Red-Cross  scheme  in  the  college — 
out  of  humanity;  he  has  been  one  of  the  main 
factors  in  the  development  of  the  Undergraduate 
Schools  Committee,  because  he  feels  he  ought  to 
do  something  for  Princeton  in  the  country  at 
large;  he  has  prepared  several  of  the  important 
undergraduate  handbooks  and  programmes,  and 
for  recreation  he  teaches  a  class  of  negroes  on 
Sunday  afternoons.  Besides  all  this,  he  always 
has  time  for  everybody  and  for  everything  new. 
Well,  it  was  he  who  first  hit  on  the  idea  of  the 


WITH  COMPLIMENTS  TO  PADDY     115 

Distributing  Agency.  As  I  see  it  now,  he  started 
that  scheme  not  so  much  with  the  idea  of  making 
money  for  himself,  for  he  didn't  need  it,  but 
primarily  to  help  me.  It  proved  to  be  a  good 
thing.  He  suggested  that  we  divide  on  the  twenty 
per  cent  and  eighty  per  cent  basis,  he  to  take  the 
twenty  per  cent.  I  couldn't  see  it  that  way,  and 
told  him  if  there  was  going  to  be  a  partnership  it 
would  have  to  be  on  even  terms  and  on  a  fifty- 
fifty  basis. 

I'll  probably  have  to  speak  about  him  again,  so 
I  won't  mention  some  of  his  other  interests.  If 
the  Distributing  Agency  was  a  success,  it's  no 
wonder — he  was  behind  it.  And  if  you  get  the 
notion  that  I  was  having  a  hard  time,  remember 
that  I  had  friends  like  that,  and  dismiss  the  no- 
tion. It  isn't  hard  to  live  in  a  world  with  fellows 
of  that  sort.    I  liked  the  life. 

The  Hardest  Year,  but  the  Best  Yet 

Do  I  regret  that  year?  No,  it  was  by  far  the 
hardest  that  I  was  to  have,  but  in  many  ways 
it  was  the  most  useful.  You  can't  carry  a  sched- 
ule of  that  sort  and  waste  time.    I  didn't  fall  off 


n6    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

in  my  studies.  The  best  grades  I  ever  received 
in  college  I  received  in  these  two  terms.  I  got  a 
very  high  third  general  for  the  year,  and,  as  you 
will  remember,  obtained  permission  to  enter  the 
honors  courses  in  my  department  the  next  fall. 

The  great  value  of  that  year  lay  in  the  fact 
that  it  taught  me  how  to  use  every  moment  of 
time.  I  could  study  for  ten  minutes  and  get  ten 
minutes'  worth  of  study  out  of  it.  I  got  into  my 
books  immediately,  and  learned  to  work  rapidly 
when  I  had  time  to  work.  This  one  lesson  has 
been  one  of  the  greatest  things  that  my  college 
course  was  to  give  me.  But  now  the  worst  was 
over,  and  the  next  two  years  were  to  be  rela- 
tively easy. 

The  gloom  with  which  I  had  started  the  year 
had  completely  worn  off.  I  felt  that  I  had  made 
progress,  that  it  was  the  best  year  that  I  had 
yet  had.  Indeed,  that  is  the  feeling  I  have  had 
at  the  close  of  every  one  of  my  years  at  Princeton. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS 

It  is  a  law  of  physics  that  action  and  reaction 
are  equal  and  opposite.  You  couldn't  expect  a 
fellow  to  go  through  what  I  have  just  told  you 
without  its  leaving  him  some  kind  of  a  souvenir. 
The  last  time  I  had  been  sick  was  about  twelve 
years  before,  and  I  had  since  often  been  told, 
as  they  looked  me  over,  that  "it's  hard  to  kill 
a  weed."  But  evidently  something  had  gone 
wrong. 

I    started    off    the    summer    vacation    feeling 

pretty  tired,  but  with  a  sense  of  relief.     The 

biggest  fights  I  have  ever  had  have  been  with 

myself.     Many   of    these    I   had   in    sophomore 

year,  trying  to  fight  off  sleep.     I  can  remember 

now  hearing  that  alarm-clock  go  off  at  five  in 

the  morning,  when  it  seemed  that  I  had  just 

fallen  asleep,  and  there  in  the  darkness  wrestling 

with  myself  and  finally  with  a  jump  getting  up 

117 


n8  COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

to  go  at  it  again  and  visit  my  hungry  furnaces. 
There  is  something  perverse  about  a  furnace, 
anyway — you  have  to  take  care  of  it  in  the 
worst  time  of  the  year  and  go  out  to  meet  it 
when  it's  dark  and  cold.  It  wouldn't  be  so  bad 
if  they  could  be  run  in  the  summer.  When  I 
took  care  of  them  I  was  always  in  a  hurry,  and, 
stoking  up,  I  would  get  very  hot  and  then  have 
to  rush  out  through  the  cold  winter  morning  to 
another.  I  had  contracted  a  number  of  colds, 
and  had  literally  suffered  during  that  year  from 
lack  of  sleep. 

A  Popular  Professor 

This  had  forced  me  occasionally  to  impose  on 
my  indulgent  professors.  Now  and  then  I  had 
stolen  a  nap.  I  dozed  while  they  thundered  on. 
There  was  one  man's  class  in  which  I  slept  quite 
regularly  and  without  reproof.  With  me  he  was 
a  popular  professor.  Unfortunately,  his  course 
came  only  three  days  a  week,  and  these  little 
kitten  naps  that  you  steal  sitting  up  only  make 
you  hungry  for  more.  I  developed  the  bad  habit 
of  wanting  to  sleep,  and  one  day  it  hit  me  in  the 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    119 

wrong  way,  at  the  wrong  time,  and  in  the  wrong 
place.  That  class  was  really  too  small  to  sleep 
in.  But  I  fell  asleep,  and,  worse  luck,  began  to 
snore ! 

A  fellow  poked  me  with:  "Hey,  he's  looking  at 
you."  I  woke  with  a  start  and,  to  do  something, 
looked  at  my  watch.  I  had  slept  forty-five  min- 
utes. The  professor  was  staring  at  me,  and  the 
class  had  turned  around  to  look. 

I  said:  "Good  night!   IVe  flunked  this  course." 

Evidently  that  professor  was  near-sighted.  I 
got  by  with  it,  for,  as  I  told  you,  I  worked  hard 
enough  and  had  luck  enough  as  a  sophomore  to 
be  allowed  to  enter  the  new  courses  for  honors 
students  at  the  beginning  of  my  junior  year. 
Why  I  didn't  stay  in  honors  is  another  story, 
but  I  owe  it  in  fairness  to  everybody  to  say  that 
I  left  on  request — on  request,  that  is,  of  my  de- 
partment. 

But,  in  any  case,  when  I  began  the  summer's 
vacation  by  working  on  the  farm  I  was  just  a 
little  bit  fagged.  My  official  position  was  now 
that  of  bookkeeper. 

I  wasn't  very  well  acquainted  with  the  various 


i2o    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

diseases,  and  so,  though  I  had  contracted  malarial 
fever,  I  didn't  know  it.  But  I  hadn't  been  feel- 
ing very  well,  and  after  a  few  weeks  decided  I'd 
better  get  a  leave  of  absence.  I  went  home  and 
went  to  the  hospital  to  have  a  slight  operation 
on  my  nose.  On  leaving  the  clinic  I  collapsed 
on  the  steps  of  a  friend's  house.  I  was  ashamed 
of  myself,  but  I  was  physically  exhausted  in  the 
full  and  complete  sense  of  that  word,  and  it 
wasn't  hard  for  something  to  get  to  me  and  lord 
it  over  me.  Malaria  had  taken  advantage  of  her 
opportunity.  I  got  a  three  weeks'  rest-cure,  and 
woke  up  one  day  feeling  fine,  went  out  for  a  walk, 
came  back  dead  tired,  and  slept  for  twenty  hours. 
A  call  came  from  the  manager  of  the  farm.  He 
wanted  me  to  take  up  the  books  again.  I  was 
still  a  little  shivery,  but  came  down  the  next  week 
and  worked  off  a  good  deal  of  my  indisposition 
before  the  end  of  summer. 

I  did  farm  work  besides  the  bookkeeping,  and 
it  was  lots  of  fun.  That  year  the  management 
gave  prizes  to  the  five  men  who  could  raise  the 
greatest  amount  of  produce  off  an  acre  of  ground. 
It  was  a  sort  of  Panama  Canal  scheme.    Yes,  I 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS     121 

got  one  of  the  prizes;  but  you  needn't  say  any- 
thing about  that,  for  there  were  no  blanks. 
Every  one  got  in  on  a  prize ! 

College  opened  with  a  bang.  You'll  remember 
that  the  last  spring  I  had  taken  orders  for  slickers, 
and  the  first  couple  of  weeks  I  was  busy  deliver- 
ing them  to  the  crowd  of  new  sophomores.  Yes, 
I  had  good  luck  with  that  deal.  The  freshmen 
are  the  easiest  fellows  to  deal  with  in  college. 
They  want  you  to  think  that  they  are  wise,  and 
they  do  things  in  flocks  because  each  one  wants 
to  do  what  the  other  fellow  does.  So,  as  I  have 
said,  if  we  got  one  freshman  in  a  crowd  to  sign 
up  for  a  slicker,  all  the  rest  followed  like  sheep. 
That's  why  the  freshmen  are  so  easily  imposed 
upon  by  the  schemers  around  college.  In  addi- 
tion to  that  I  was  signing  up  men  for  the  Press- 
ing Establishment.  How  had  I  gotten  back  in? 
It's  a  long  story.    All  right,  I'll  tell  you. 

The  Undergraduate  Magnate 

Well,  my  entrance  into  the  Students'  Pressing 
Establishment  marks  a  new  chapter  in  my  finan- 
cial experiments,  and  it  will  be  pretty  hard  to 


122    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

explain  the  whole  situation.  Up  to  this  time,  with 
the  exception  of  the  Distributing  Agency,  I  had 
worked  at  what  might  be  called  odd  jobs.  I 
was  the  employee.  I  was  now  about  to  become 
an  undergraduate  business  man,  and  because  of 
the  conditions  of  college  life  it  is  pretty  hard  for 
a  man — pretty  nearly  impossible — to  get  into  it 
before  the  junior  year.  Seniority  counts  for  a 
good  deal  in  college.  And  then  there  is  a  prej- 
udice against  the  sophomore  and  the  freshman; 
they  have  no  status  in  college  when  it  comes  to 
serious  things;  they  only  count  in  the  catalogue. 
Undergraduate  business,  furthermore,  is  necessa- 
rily very  complicated,  and  once  in  a  while  a  selfish 
individual  makes  it  more  than  complicated.  You 
know,  it  must  be  completely  reorganized  every 
year.  It  grows  up  at  haphazard,  has  its  ups  and 
downs,  and  it  is  difficult  to  tell  where  one  part- 
ner's interest  begins  and  ends.  Furthermore,  stu- 
dents, as  a  rule,  are  apprentices  at  business. 

I  will  illustrate  from  the  history  of  only  one 
student  enterprise — though  it  would  not  be  fair 
to  take  this  as  typical,  except  along  certain  lines. 
Usually  there  is  no  capital,  there  is  only  good- 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    123 

will.  In  this  case  there  had  been  a  little  capital, 
but  the  good-will  had  by  this  time  leaked  out. 
In  a  certain  year  an  upper  classman  had  con- 
ceived the  idea  that  it  would  be  a  good  thing  to 
start  a  pressing  establishment  on  the  campus  for 
the  students.  He  procured  a  room,  bought  the 
necessary  tools  and  materials,  and,  by  hiring 
experienced  outside  help  to  do  the  pressing  and 
students  to  do  the  collecting  and  delivering, 
started  up  a  business.  It  prospered,  and  when 
he  had  developed  it  to  its  maximum  of  efficiency 
he  was  graduated.  That  business,  of  course,  had 
belonged  to  him.  It  was  his  idea,  his  capital,  and 
his  plant.  He  still  had  a  number  of  accounts 
due  him.  As  was  natural,  he  carried  off  the  books 
and  collected  the  accounts.  As  he  was  a  gener- 
ous chap,  he  turned  over  the  business  and  all 
the  paraphernalia  to  three  men,  one  of  whom  was 
to  be  the  manager  for  the  succeeding  year.  He 
did  not  sell  it  to  them.  He  was  merely  allowing 
them  to  run  it  during  their  time  in  college,  they 
in  turn  to  pass  it  on  to  their  successors.  Now,  you 
can  see  that  the  status  of  the  new  manager,  who 
did  not  own  the  business,  who  is  merely  manager 


i24    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

and  not  proprietor,  as  the  founder  was,  will  be 
somewhat  undefined;  and  here,  as  in  many  cases, 
there  was  no  constitution  by  which  they  could  be 
guided. 

When,  then,  the  second  manager's  college  ca- 
reer ended  he  had  no  valid  precedents  to  go  by. 
What  was  to  become  of  outstanding  accounts 
now,  and  how  were  the  profits  to  be  divided? 
After  an  undergraduate  business  scheme  has  gone 
through  several  such  processes  of  reorganization 
you  can  see  that  it  stands  a  first-rate  chance  of 
being  so  hopelessly  muddled  that  a  Philadelphia 
lawyer  couldn't  straighten  it  out.  This  had  come 
to  be  the  case  in  the  Students'  Pressing  Estab- 
lishment at  the  time  of  my  entrance.  Everything 
was  at  sixes  and  sevens. 

Does  the  Bureau  of  Self-Help  have  any  con- 
nection with  these  business  organizations?  I 
should  say  it  did!  That  is,  it  does  now.  Or- 
dinarily the  bureau  does  not  bother  about  enter- 
prises that  are  running  along  smoothly,  but  when 
a  hitch  comes  the  bureau  straightens  it  out  and 
turns  it  back  to  the  students.  One  of  the  men, 
whose  status  as  one  of  the  managers  was  doubt- 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    125 

ful,  wanted  to  get  out  and  I  wanted  to  get  in.  I 
did. 

Did  the  secretary  of  the  bureau  know  any- 
thing about  this?  Yes,  he  did.  There  were  sub- 
sequent complications  and  I  had  to  go  to  him  and 
explain  the  whole  situation.  As  you  know,  there 
is  now  a  new  secretary  of  the  bureau.  When  I  had 
got  all  through,  after  I  thought  I  had  told  him 
everything,  this  new  secretary  started  in  where  I 
left  off  and  continued  the  story.  It  was  a  case  of 
"continued  in  our  next,"  and  he  knew  more  about 
that  business  than  I  did.  But,  after  all,  he  left  me 
in  my  place.  Yes,  I  am  the  manager  now.  And 
after  that  conversation  with  the  secretary  I  had 
a  lot  of  respect  for  him.  He  is  a  peach  of  a  lad, 
anyway. 

Why  was  I  so  anxious  to  get  in?  Because  I 
knew  that  this  could  be  made  a  good  business 
if  it  were  properly  run.  I  knew  something 
about  it,  for  I  had  worked  for  the  establishment 
in  my  freshman  year.  There  was  a  chance  to  get 
in,  and,  as  I  intended  to  be  part  of  it,  I  took  the 
chance. 

The  method  which  is  now  in  vogue  and  which 


126    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

has  proved  most  satisfactory  is  to  take  in  by 
competition  one  member  of  the  freshman  class 
every  year.  In  sophomore  year  he  is  given  a 
position  of  minor  importance,  he  rises  as  a  junior, 
and  as  senior  becomes  manager.  This  provides 
for  a  regular  progression. 

Staking  His  Reputation 

For  reasons  which  I  need  not  mention,  at  that 
time  the  Students'  Pressing  Establishment  didn't 
stand  too  well  on  the  campus.  Signing  up  cus- 
tomers was  therefore  no  easy  job.  Everybody 
had  lost  faith  in  the  establishment.  Student 
traditions  persist,  and  we  had  to  keep  the  name 
of  the  firm,  and  that  name  was  then  no  longer 
a  good  one.  At  the  mention  of  it  the  fellows 
would  look  the  other  way,  for  a  great  many  of 
them  were  my  friends  and  they  hated  to  hurt 
my  feelings.  Yes,  for  one  reason  and  another  I 
had  been  very  much  in  evidence  on  the  campus 
during  the  past  two  years,  and  therefore,  like  the 
village  blacksmith,  almost  every  one  knew  me. 
When  I  met  men  who  had  been  too  slow  to  sign 
up  with  some  other  pressing  firm,  there  were  un- 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    127 

comfortable  moments  for  both  of  us,  and  I  finally 
signed  up  my  men  by  staking  my  reputation  that 
we  would  come  through  to  their  entire  satisfac- 
tion. It  was  like  pulling  teeth,  but  I  was  bound 
to  do  my  best  to  try  to  make  it  go. 

Was  I  still  doing  other  work?  Oh,  yes.  I  had 
my  stint  at  the  commons,  I  was  bookkeeper  for 
the  farm  until  January  1,  was  doing  my  share 
for  the  Distributing  Agency — which,  incidentally, 
was  humming  now — and  I  worked  in  the  library 
twelve  hours  a  week.  Don't  get  the  idea  that  I 
was  the  librarian.  I  sat  in  the  cellar  arranging 
dusty  books,  or  up-stairs  somewhere,  and  pasted 
labels  into  them.  I  threw  up  that  job  after  a 
while,  and,  now  that  I  had  learned  how  to  run 
them,  I  didn't  take  care  of  any  more  furnaces. 

Business  Efficiency 

But  with  this  new  work  in  the  Pressing  Estab- 
lishment I  realized  that  I  was  beginning  another 
chapter.  It  was  Pike's  Peak  or  bust,  so  we 
started  to  develop  the  business.  As  to  the  ex- 
ecutive end  of  the  work,  we  got  up  a  constitu- 
tion and  tried  to  put  the  thing  on  a  businesslike 


128    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

basis.  There  was  no  longer  to  be  any  appeal  to 
any  one's  sentiment.  People  were  going  to  get 
value  received  for  their  money.  We  held  weekly 
meetings  and  kept  minutes  and  discussed  the 
complaints  and  suggestions.  We  brought  in  a 
new  system  and  made  it  compete  successfully 
with  other  establishments  of  the  same  sort  in 
town.  Our  pressers  had  been  losing  a  lot  of 
time  walking  to  and  fro  heating  their  irons 
over  the  gas.  We  installed  electric  irons  and 
gained  about  15  per  cent  in  efficiency.  One  of 
the  complaints  had  been  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  men  delivering  the  clothes  and  carrying  them 
over  their  arm  mussed  them  up  somewhat, 
especially  in  damp  weather.  So  we  designed  and 
had  made  for  us  a  wagon  that  could  be  easily 
pushed  about  on  the  campus.  It  is  the  one  we 
still  use,  and,  so  far  as  I  know,  is  the  only  one 
of  its  kind  in  existence.  It  carries  sixty  suits, 
and  they  are  hung  as  they  are  in  a  wardrobe,  so 
that  the  suits  are  now  delivered  in  perfect  condi- 
tion. It  eliminated  many  complaints  and  saved 
us  the  time  of  two  men,  and  after  some  hard  work 
we  made  out  very  well  on  the  year's  business;  and, 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    129 

as  my  regular  position  there  now  brought  me  a 
snug  little  sum,  I  began  to  have  more  time  to 
circulate  on  my  own  account. 

"Parlor-Snake  Stuff" 

I  suppose  you  could  say  that  I  was  slowly 
getting  an  entree  into  what  you  might  call  high- 
brow society;  but  I  never  could  pull  that  line  of 
talk  and  feel  easy.  I  tried  that  flowery  stuff 
once  and  fell  down.  I  guess  it  takes  more  than 
four  years  to  put  that  into  a  fellow.  But  I  didn't 
hanker  for  it;  I  did  it  for  fun,  the  way  a  nice  girl 
might  try  to  smoke  a  cigarette.  I  confess  it 
never  appealed  to  me,  from  the  very  first  fresh- 
man reception  that  I  attended,  and  that  was 
my  first  plunge.  It  struck  me  as  hollow  and 
affected. 

You  want  to  know  how  I  feel  about  it?  Well, 
it's  very  strange  to  me.  You  take  a  lot  of  fel- 
lows in  a  college  room,  somebody's  den,  with  their 
coats  off  and  feet  on  the  table — each  chap  talks 
because  he  wants  to  and  says  what  he  believes. 
You  are  man  for  man  and  every  one  is  taken  at 
his  face  value.     You  take  that  same  crowd  in 


i3o    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

dress  suits  and  a  lot  of  young  ladies  around — I 
don't  know  how  to  express  it,  but  there  is  a 
psychological  atmosphere  that  makes  them  any- 
thing but  themselves.  When  they  come  out  with 
that  parlor-snake  stuff  they  don't  believe  it,  or 
expect  any  one  else  to.  They  are  trying  to  get 
away  with  something.  Instead  of  being  willing 
to  be  taken  at  ioo  per  cent  face  value,  they  are 
trying  to  get  away  with  150  per  cent.  I  haven't 
got  those  manners,  but  I  suppose  you've  got  to 
have  them.  No,  I  never  wore  a  dress  suit;  I'm 
afraid  it  would  bind  me. 

One  day  I  ran  into  a  crowd  of  my  swell  friends. 
They  asked  me  where  I  was  from  and  I  told 
them.  You  know,  it  is  the  slum  section  of  my 
town,  and  you  probably  have  some  idea  of  what 
it  is  like  from  what  I  have  told  you. 

When  I  told  the  crowd  where  I  came  from 
one  of  the  fellows  gave  me  a  queer  glance,  as 
much  as  to  say: 

"You  don't  look  like  a  rough-neck." 

It  was  all  the  same  to  them  whether  I  came 
from  Rotten  Row  or  from  Riverside  Drive. 

I  remember  on  another  occasion,  when  I  told 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    131 

a  young  lady  interested  in  social  work  about  the 
part  of  the  country  from  which  I  came,  she  said: 

"Then  you  have  heard  about  B ,"  refer- 
ring to  my  section,  which  goes  by  a  rather  ugly 
name. 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "I'd  be  delighted  to  take  you 
through  some  time." 

"So  you're  interested  in  social  economics?" 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "very  much,  but  I  am  more 
interested  in  my  old  home." 

Do  I  still  live  in  the  house  where  I  lived  as  a 
boy?  Oh,  no,  not  many  poor  fellows  have  that 
good  or  bad  luck.  A  poor  family  moves  often. 
But  we  still  live  over  in  that  section  of  the 
country,  and  I  go  back  quite  regularly. 

I  don't  feel  that  I  have  lost  touch  with  my 
former  acquaintances  over  there.  I  still  call 
them  by  their  nicknames  when  I  see  them.  You 
remember  that  railroad  detective  who  marched 
me  to  the  station  once  under  rather  interesting 
circumstances?  He's  become  a  regular  member 
of  the  police  force,  and  he  takes  off  his  hat  to  me 
now  when  we  pass.  I  believe  he's  one  of  the  few 
in  the  old  place  who  call  me  mister. 


i32    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

Is  College  Democratic? 

What  do  I  think  of  my  high-bred  friends  as  a 
lot?  A  mighty  fine  crowd.  There  are  very  few 
of  them  who,  if  they  have  money,  let  you  know 
it.  The  fellows  who  are  the  snobs  are  either  the 
nouveaux  riches,  or  fellows  whose  parents  have 
gone  to  rack  and  ruin  because  they  are  trying 
to  keep  up  appearances  and  have  nothing  to  do 
it  on.  I  may  be  wrong,  but  that's  been  my  ex- 
perience. 

Is  college  life  more  democratic  than  the  life 
outside?  Say,  that's  a  humdinger  of  a  question. 
I  can't  answer.  You  make  me  talk  as  if  I  were 
on  the  witness-stand.  My  opinion?  All  right. 
College  life  as  I  have  found  it  has  been  very 
democratic.  It  wouldn't  have  been  any  place 
for  me  if  it  hadn't  been,  for  I  had  never  been  out 
among  people  before  I  came  here,  and  the  class 
that  I'd  been  brought  up  with  are  fiercely  demo- 
cratic. There  are  distinctions  in  college,  but  they 
are  not  the  same  distinctions  as  in  the  outside 
world  and  they  are  not  based  on  your  parents' 
status.     Men  are  divided  along  different  lines. 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    133 

There  is  the  athlete  and  the  scholar,  the  good 
fellow  and  the  stay-at-home.  It's  a  case  of  birds 
of  a  feather.  Then,  too,  there  are  distinctions  be- 
tween the  college  classes.  In  my  freshman  year 
an  upper  classman  thought  he  condescended  and 
laid  up  treasure  in  heaven  when  he  spoke  to  a 
freshman  like  myself.  I  myself  as  a  sophomore 
felt  for  the  first  months  that  I  was  lowering  my- 
self to  speak  to  a  freshman,  but  I  tell  you  that 
that  went  away  awfully  fast,  and  not  in  my  case 
alone.  I  think  it's  general.  There  are  social 
snobs,  but  they  are  having  a  poor  time  of  it,  and 
they  are  so  few  that  they  are  not  even  making  a 
crowd  for  themselves. 

The  college  is  not  responsible  for  a  few  isolated 
cases  like  that.  You  meet  them  everywhere,  and 
you  can't  expect  to  find  everybody  ideal.  Col- 
lege is  an  isolated  community,  and  the  knocks 
you  get  here  are  not  as  hard  as  those  in  the  out- 
side world,  but  you've  got  to  expect  some.  Every 
fellow  in  college  will  meet  with  the  same  kind  of 
treatment.  His  own  face  will  be  reflected  in  the 
other  fellow's  face :  a  smile  will  bring  a  smile,  a 
jest  a  jest,  and  a  gloom  a  gloom.    I  learned  that 


i34    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

early,  so  I  decided  to  be  my  own  gloom-consumer, 
and  when  I  was  blue  I  kept  it  to  myself  or  told 
only  a  very  few  of  my  very  best  friends.  But  I 
don't  think  any  place  can  be  really  more  demo- 
cratic in  this  world  than  a  place  like  Princeton 
after  a  football  victory  over  Yale.  When  college 
interests  really  bind  men  together  everything 
else  is  lost  sight  of,  and  in  college  life  college 
interests  generally  predominate. 

Would  I  say  that  any  one  discriminated  against 
me  because  I  was  working  my  way?  I  think  I 
said  no  to  that  before,  but  I'd  like  to  make  it 
emphatic.  I  received  all  sorts  of  encouragement, 
as  do  any  and  all  fellows  who  work  their  way. 
The  trouble  is  that  some  fellows  who  are  "work- 
ing their  way"  and  are  clamoring  for  a  job  are 
afraid  to  dirty  their  hands  when  a  job  is  offered 
them.  My  advice  to  the  man  who  has  to  work 
is  to  swallow  his  pride  when  a  job  comes  along, 
and  do  it.  If  he  is  too  genteel  for  any  honest 
work  that  has  to  be  done,  let  him  stay  away — 
for  his  own  good.  He  will  be  in  everybody's 
way,  including  his  own.  No  one  is  discriminated 
against  for  doing  any  honest  piece  of  work  hon- 


UNDERGRADUATE  BIG  BUSINESS    135 

estly.  By  this  time  I  had  turned  my  hand  to 
about  everything,  and  I  never  noticed  any  dif- 
ference in  the  attitude  of  any  one  worth  while 
around  college. 


CHAPTER  IX 

DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE 

Before  I  begin  to  talk  about  my  lazy  years, 

I  dare  say  that  I  hadn't  been  a  turtle.    No,  the 

turtle  isn't  a  secret  society.    I'll  have  to  explain, 

because  I  first  got  a  lot  of  fun  thinking  about  that 

reptile,  and  later  some  solid  satisfaction.    There 

was  an  unused  top  floor  in  an  annex  of  my  high 

school  and  it  was  decided  to  institute  a  course 

in  manual  training.    The  department  was  turned 

over  to  an  old  German  who  looked  like  Socrates 

and  whom  we'll  call  Johann.    His  qualifications 

for  this  work  were  somewhat  unique.     He  had 

owned  a  carpet-cleaning  establishment  and  prior 

to  that  had  been  an  undertaker.     I  sometimes 

thought  that  his  career  as  undertaker  had  left 

its  mark  on  him,  and  that  he  was  trying  to  kill 

us;  for,  as  dead  men,  it  would  have  been  easier 

for  him  to  handle  us.    Living,  we  gave  him  a  good 

deal  of  worry. 

136 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  137 

During  the  noon  hour  he  used  to  console  him- 
self in  the  saloon  across  the  way.  After  he 
started  in  the  school  work  he  became  like  other 
teachers  and  rapidly  acquired  the  idea  that  the 
whole  educational  system  existed  for  the  pur- 
pose of  finally  teaching  manual  training.  He 
used  to  tell  us  that  "dee  chief  events  of  manual 
training  ees  to  learn  to  deevelop  dee  faculties  of 
dee  prain."  It  became  for  him  the  alpha  and 
omega  of  all  education,  and,  above  all,  it  incul- 
cated the  final  virtue  of  industry.  I  used  to  try 
to  create  the  illusion  of  being  busy  by  working 
my  plane  with  a  full-arm  swing  and  making  great 
heaps  of  shavings,  till  he  walked  up  one  day, 
looked  at  the  heap,  looked  at  me,  and  mumbled 
in  disgust  as  he  scratched  his  head:  "Dee  more 
shavings,  dee  less  prains." 

I  had  learned  a  good  deal  of  this  wisdom  from 
old  Johann.  He  used  to  remind  us  that  America 
was  the  country  of  opportunity,  and,  as  the  prime 
example  of  success,  used  to  cite  himself  and  tell 
us  how  when  he  arrived  here  as  a  penniless  emi- 
grant he  had  gone  out  into  a  little  lumber  camp. 
"Dey  vas  five  Irishmens  und  I  vas  dee  sixd,  und 


138    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

vee  vent  oud  in  dee  voods  chopping  vood."  This 
little  preludio  always  brought  him  a  round  of 
applause  from  young  America. 

Well,  Johann  was  not  a  patient  man,  and  I 
tried  his  soul,  so  he  used  to  labor  with  argument 
and  threat  to  teach  me  industry,  of  which,  under 
the  circumstances,  I  naturally  pretended  to  have 
even  less  than  I  had.  I  once  drove  him  to  de- 
spair and  he  left  me  to  think  over  my  sins.  After 
about  ten  minutes  of  deep  contemplation  he 
walked  slowly  up  to  the  blackboard  and  drew 
(he  was  an  excellent  draftsman)  a  large  picture 
of  a  turtle.  He  had  left  me  in  anger  and  re- 
turned to  stand  by  me  in  a  mood  of  entreaty. 
"Now,  X,"  he  said,  calling  me  by  my  first  name, 
"I  vant  you  to  do  someding  for  me.  Venever 
you  come  in  dis  room,  look  up  at  dot  picdure,  und 
say  to  yourself:  'Doan  be  a  tuddle.  Doan  be  a 
schlow,  crawling  creadure.'  Und  den  git  to  voork. 
Now,  remember  dot  as  long  as  you  lif."  Well, 
between  you  and  me,  I  have  and  I  will. 

Old  Johann  had  a  good  deal  of  interest  in  us, 
but  he  didn't  understand  our  kind,  and  we  used 
to  drive  him  into  fits  of  frantic  temper  and  rage, 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  139 

and  I  had  the  notion  that  he  was  an  ugly  old 
bear,  until  I  learned  from  one  of  the  boys  who 
lived  near  him  that  his  wife  had  for  ten  years 
been  a  helpless  paralytic  and  that  at  home,  where 
he  spent  all  of  his  time  after  school  hours,  he 
was  as  tender  and  devoted  as  a  child.  About 
this  time  in  my  college  career  the  old  fellow  died 
(God  rest  his  soul) ;  and  if  I  tell  you  all  this  it  is 
because  his  death  brought  it  back  to  me  with 
peculiar  force,  and  it  was  some  satisfaction  to 
recall  that,  if  I  had  wasted  a  good  deal  of  his 
patience  and  time,  I  had  at  least  not  forgotten 
the  big  lesson  he  had  tried  to  teach  me.  When 
I  remembered  all  the  times  I  had  laughed  at 
poor  old  Johann,  I  felt  I  had  made  some  amends, 
at  least,  by  not  having  been  altogether  a  turtle. 
At  least  I  suppose  I  can  say  I  hadn't  been  so 
up  to  this  time. 

Recreation 

Of  course  I  was  a  junior  now,  and  took  things 
more  easily.  I  went  home  more  often  and  had 
more  hours  for  recreation.  Some  of  it  I  still 
took  out  in  the  way  of  athletics.    Baseball  and 


i4o    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

basket-ball  were  my  craze.  I  had  learned  to  play 
tennis  while  I  was  working  on  the  farm  in  the 
summer,  and  in  the  evenings  or  on  rainy  days  I 
turned  to  indoor  sport  occasionally  and  played 
my  game  of  chess.  I  didn't  play  cards;  except 
once  in  a  while,  when  both  of  us  were  blue, 
my  roommate  and  I  played  for  a  "jigger."  Of 
course  I  had  played  before  I  got  to  college.  You 
couldn't  have  lived  where  I  had  lived  and  not 
play  cards.  I  suppose  I  knew  almost  every  game 
that  is  played  with  pasteboards,  but  I  thought  it 
was  best  to  cut  it  out.  You  will  remember  that  I 
took  a  bottle  of  beer  occasionally  when  I  was  339. 
I  gave  that  up,  too,  and  I  didn't  smoke  until  I 
came  to  be  a  senior.  But  I  had  nearly  smoked 
myself  to  death  when  I  was  nine.  I  dropped  it 
at  that  time.  You  see,  I'd  had  my  chance  to 
go  to  the  dogs  before  I  got  here.  Many  fellows 
don't  get  theirs  until  they  come  to  college.  I 
didn't  think  it  was  worth  while  to  fool  with  that 
kind  of  stuff  any  longer. 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  141 

"Bright  College  Years" 

Oh,  yes,  I'd  learned  a  lot  of  poor  stunts  in  the 
streets.  But  there  was  one  good  thing  that  I 
learned  and  it  has  helped  to  make  life  pleasant 
for  me.  I  suppose  it  was  there  that  I  picked  up 
a  manner  which  makes  it  possible  for  me  to  ap- 
proach fellows  without  the  formality  of  an  in- 
troduction. I  have  always  managed  to  get  in 
with  a  congenial  crowd,  and  before  I  got  through 
with  them  always  had  a  good  time.  No  matter 
how  busy  I  was,  I  was  happy.  You  can't  help 
being  happy  here  if  you  take  it  right.  You  ought 
to  be.  If  a  man  can't  be  happy  in  college  there 
is  something  wrong  with  him,  and  he'll  never  be 
happy  anywhere. 

Now  that  I  could  see  daylight  ahead,  the  time 
flew  so  quickly  that  days  and  weeks  were  gone 
before  I  knew  it.  I  never  worried  when  I  had 
work.  It  was  only  when  I  didn't  that  I  had 
worried,  and  now  things  were  running  nicely. 
When  I  was  keyed  up  doing  a  thousand  and  one 
different  things  I  came  to  have  the  keenest  en- 
joyment in  life.    No,  I  was  not  doing  "society"; 


i42    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

that  never  was  my  line;  but  I  was  learning  a 
good  deal  about  a  kind  of  life  which  had  been 
absolutely  new  and  strange  to  me.  Of  course 
I  had  never  seen  men  live  the  way  the  wealthy 
fellows  do  around  college.  I  wasn't  only  watch- 
ing "the  other  half,"  I  came  into  pretty  close 
contact  with  them. 

But  the  worst  of  the  fight  was  over  now.  My 
work  at  the  library  and  at  commons  was  enough 
to  pay  for  all  of  my  board  and  a  good  part  of  my 
room-rent,  for  I  was  getting  a  room  in  Hill  Dor- 
mitory that  had  been  left  unoccupied  for  less  than 
I  had  paid  in  my  freshman  year.  I  now  knew 
my  way  around  and  could  reduce  my  regular 
overhead  charges.  What  I  received  from  the 
Pressing  Establishment  and  the  Distributing 
Agency,  the  management  of  the  sales  of  pro- 
grammes and  incidental  work,  gave  me  a  margin 
on  which  to  pay  off  old  debts  and  live  a  little 
more  easily.  I  dressed  like  the  other  fellows,  for 
you  know  none  of  us  spends  much  money  on 
clothes  here — I  suppose  because  there  are  no 
co-eds.  And  one  of  the  nice  things  about  it  was 
the  fact  that  money  now  came  in  bunches.     I 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  143 

sat  back  in  my  room  and  waited  for  it.  As  a 
sophomore,  it  was  three  or  five  dollars  at  a  clip. 
Now  it  usually  came  in  checks  of  twenty-five  or 
fifty,  and,  as  the  work  was  organized,  my  time 
was  not  chopped  up  as  it  had  been.  But  don't 
get  the  notion  that  I  was  living  on  three  meals  a 
day  and  my  books.  There  was  something  to  do 
now  and  then,  after  all,  but  just  enough  to  make 
life  interesting. 

Did  the  boys  treat  me  any  differently  when  I 
was  a  manager  than  they  did  when  I  was  stok- 
ing furnaces  and  blacking  shoes?  They  certainly 
did  not.  And  I  can  finish  up  this  talk  on  de- 
mocracy with  an  instance  that  will  show  you  the 
situation.  When  I  had  to  leave  town  I  got  at 
times  some  very  wealthy  boys  to  substitute  for 
me  and  do  this  "dirty  work."  Did  they  do  it  to 
oblige  me?  They  surely  did,  and  when  I  offered 
them  their  share  of  the  month's  pay  they  wouldn't 
take  it,  and,  if  I  forced  it  on  them  later,  took  it 
and  kept  it  as  a  souvenir.  It's  an  ideal  world  we 
live  in.  It  isn't  everywhere  you  go  that  you  can 
be  taken  for  what  you  are  worth. 

Oh,   no,   I  wasn't  wasting  my  time,  and  I 


i44    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

wouldn't  call  myself  a  magnate.  I  did  lots  of 
work  myself  and  had  many  long,  hard  days,  but 
I  liked  what  I  was  doing  and  did  it  for  its  own 
sake  as  well  as  its  cash  value.  When  you  get 
right  down  to  hard  work  and  finally  accomplish 
something,  you  have  a  feeling  of  keen  inward 
satisfaction.  You  know  it,  a  sort  of  self-satisfied 
feeling  for  the  moment,  and  self-congratulatory. 
It's  a  feeling  of  reward  for  the  work's  sake.  I 
didn't  do  as  much  physical  work  as  I  had  done, 
and  I  didn't  have  to  put  in  as  many  hours  as 
I  had  done  as  freshman  or  sophomore.  I  had 
learned  how  to  do  a  good  many  things,  and  I  sup- 
pose you  might  say  that  I  was  beginning  to  be 
paid  for  "knowing  how."  I  liked  scheming  and 
planning.    Yes,  I  can  give  you  an  instance. 

Getting  Paid  for  an  Idea 

It  was  getting  warm  again.  The  winter  was 
over  and  the  world  had  a  pleasant  look.  I  was 
carrying  around  my  circulars  for  the  Distributing 
Agency,  stepped  into  a  room  in  Blair,  and  ran 
into  a  crowd  of  fellows  discussing  things.  They 
were  the  business  and  editorial  departments  of  the 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  145 

newly  created  Princeton  Pictorial  Review.  They 
asked  me  if  I  would  handle  their  "Pics"  for  the 
Cornell  and  Yale  games.  I  told  them  that  I 
would  probably  be  taking  care  of  a  reunion  class 
but  that  I  would  consider  it.  How  many  did 
they  expect  to  sell?    One  hundred,  they  said. 

"I  want  your  outside  limit." 

"A  hundred  and  twenty-five." 

"Well,"  I  said,  'Til  let  you  know  in  a  couple 
of  days." 

As  I  went  on  distributing  the  circulars  I  had 
what  I  thought  was  a  bright  idea.  I  knew  that 
no  programme  was  to  be  issued  that  year  for  the 
Cornell  or  Yale  baseball  games,  so  I  went  to  the 
secretary  of  the  Self-Help  Bureau  and  asked  him 
if  I  couldn't  get  out  a  programme  for  him,  print 
it  in  the  "Pic"  and  use  the  "Pic"  as  the  pro- 
gramme. He  said  I'd  have  to  make  arrange- 
ments with  the  treasurer  of  the  athletic  associa- 
tion. That  was  easy.  I  went  back  to  the  room 
in  Blair.  The  same  fellows  were  still  having  the 
same  conference.  I  said  to  them:  "What's  your 
proposition  if  I  take  the  job?" 

"Two  cents  a  copy  on  all  copies  sold." 


i46    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  said:  "The  men  selling  for  me,  of  course,  are 
to  get  five." 

They  agreed. 

You  don't  understand?  Well,  you  must  re- 
member that  I  had  organized  a  system  of  sell- 
ing college  magazines,  programmes,  etc.  I  had 
picked  out  the  best  sellers  in  college  and  I  paid 
them  the  regular  rate.  In  addition  I  got  a  com- 
mission on  all  sales  for  taking  complete  charge  of 
the  distribution,  turning  in  the  f unds,  and  so  forth. 

Now,  in  this  arrangement  with  the  "Pic,"  you 
understand,  of  course,  that  I  was  to  manage  all 
the  sales.    I  said  to  them: 

"You  expect  me  to  sell  one  hundred  and 
twenty-five  as  an  outside  limit?" 

"Yes." 

"Fve  listened  to  your  proposition,  now  you 
listen  to  mine.  Will  you  be  willing  to  give  me 
five  cents  a  copy  as  my  commission  on  every 
'Pic'  I  sell  over  one  hundred  and  twenty-five?" 

"Yes." 

"All  right,  it's  a  go.  Order  three  hundred  for 
the  Cornell  game  and  two  thousand  for  the  Yale 
game." 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  147 

They  thought  I'd  gone  crazy. 

"What's  the  idea?" 

And  I  told  them:  "The  'Pic9  is  a  new  institu- 
tion. You  advertise  in  The  Princetonian  and  in 
The  Alumni  Weekly  that  we  are  going  to  bring 
The  Pictorial  Review  before  the  alumni  at  the  Yale 
game  by  selling  it  instead  of  the  regular  pro- 
gramme. This  'Pic'  will  be  a  regular  issue,  with 
the  exception  that  there  will  be  a  baseball  line- 
up in  the  centre  of  it." 

The  fellows  thought  this  was  good  stuff.  Nev- 
ertheless, they  were  a  little  bit  afraid  of  them- 
selves, and  gave  me  only  two  hundred  "Pics" 
for  the  Cornell  game.  The  baseball  programme 
for  the  Cornell  game  was  printed  in  the  issue, 
and  we  also  inserted  a  loose-leaved  track  pro- 
gramme, as  there  was  also  a  track  meet  that  day. 

I  had  sold  out  the  issue  a  half-hour  before 
the  game  began.  This  gave  them  confidence; 
but  they  thought  I  was  earning  too  much  money, 
so  they  cut  down  my  commission  for  the  Yale 
game.  My  original  proposition  had  taken  them 
off  their  feet,  and  I  therefore  agreed  to  the  re- 
duction.    Some  days  later  they  suggested  a  fur- 


148    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

ther  reduction  and  wanted  to  give  me  only  half 
of  the  original  commission.     I  said: 

"Business  is  business.  Either  you  pay  me 
three  cents  and  a  half  or  all  bets  are  off  and 
there  will  be  no  programme." 

But,  to  show  that  I  had  more  confidence  in 
the  proposition  than  they  did,  I  guaranteed  to 
sell  at  least  one  thousand  before  I  took  any  com- 
mission whatever.  This  relieved  them  of  their 
anxiety  and  they  agreed.  I  engaged  picked  men 
as  salesmen,  and  on  the  day  of  the  Yale  game 
sold  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty 
copies,  instead  of  the  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  they  had  counted  on.  The  business  manager 
was  elated.  So  was  I.  It  wasn't  a  bad  day's 
work,  and,  besides,  in  the  words  of  William 
Shakespeare,  it  had  been  'as  easy  as  lying'  and 
much  safer. 

How  were  my  studies  progressing?  Fair  to 
middling.  They  interested  me,  of  course — that's 
why  I  came  to  college;  but  I  had  also  come  with 
the  definite  idea  of  becoming  a  teacher.  I  had 
been  brought  up  by  teachers  and  wanted  to  be 
one  myself,  but  unconsciously  I  defeated  my  own 


DON'T  BE  A  TURTLE  149 

purpose.  I  was  becoming  involved  in  so  many 
varied  business  deals,  especially  in  my  last  two 
years,  and  was  expending  so  much  interest  and 
energy  upon  them,  that  I  had  come  to  feel  that  I 
should  very  likely  enter  "business"  as  my  "pro- 
fession." 

Yes,  I  was  getting  along  first-rate  financially, 
and  had  come  to  the  point  where  I  could  turn 
odd  jobs  away  if  I  wanted  to.  I  earned  a  great 
deal  more  than  I  had  previously,  and  was  begin- 
ning to  get  into  the  managing  of  things.  I  was 
not  living  extravagantly,  though  more  comfort- 
ably. 

No,  I  was  not  putting  money  in  the  bank. 
There  were  other  places  for  it. 

Yes,  I  practically  always  owed  the  treasurer 
money,  but  it  was  now  from  force  of  habit  and 
not  from  force  of  circumstances.  I  don't  mean 
by  that  that  when  I  had  money  I  didn't  pay  him; 
but  I  had  many  uses  for  the  money  which  I  can't 
explain  to  you,  and  I  enjoyed  a  certain  sense  of 
security  in  knowing  that  I  could  always  pay  my 
treasurer's  bill  when  I  had  to. 


CHAPTER  X 
A   SENIOR   AT   LAST 

Well,  I  was  a  senior  now.  How  did  it  seem 
to  be  in  my  last  year?  It  was  in  the  natural 
course  of  events.  I  had  expected  to  become  a 
senior  and  it  was  all  O.  K.  No,  there  wasn't  the 
feeling  of  jubilation  that  I  had  in  passing  from 
freshman  to  sophomore  year.  My  old  troubles 
were  practically  over  and  it  was  easy  sledding. 
I  knew  where  I  was  going  to  live;  I  had  my  room 
in  Reunion;  I  had  my  friends.  Furthermore,  I 
had  my  work  cut  out  for  me,  and  I  now  knew 
how  to  do  it. 

Was  I  looking  for  more  work?  Yes,  I  was 
always  doing  that,  but  it  now  came  without  my 
going  after  it;  and  what  I  wanted  most  was  new 
work  in  the  way  of  organizing  and  starting  things 
that  gave  me  a  chance  to  use  my  past  experience. 

You  remember  when  I  came  as  a  freshman 

that  morning  before  eight  o'clock  and  sat  with 

150 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  151 

my  little  satchel  out  on  the  front  campus  like  a 
lost  soul,  and  wondered  at  the  fellows  in  flannel 
trousers  who  were  greeting  each  other  as  they 
came  along  the  walk  toward  Nassau  Hall?  Well, 
I  was  one  of  those  fellows  in  flannel  trousers 
now,  and  I  suppose  poor  freshmen  with  lumps 
in  their  throats  wondered  at  prosperous  me.  Any 
freshman  who  came  as  I  had  come  must  cer- 
tainly have  thought  about  me  as  I  did  about  the 
other  fellows  when  I  was  a  freshie.  He  must 
have  believed  that  I  was  a  prime  hypocrite.  I 
was  going  around  like  the  rest  of  them,  shaking 
hands,  feeling  fine  to  see  them  again,  and  saying: 

"How  are  you?" 

"Have  you  had  a  pleasant  summer ?" 

Did  I  see  any  freshman  who  looked  as  if  he 
were  in  just  about  the  same  fix  I  was  in  when  I 
first  hit  the  campus? 

Yes,  it  was  odd — I  did  see  one  such  chap,  and 
college  had  opened  again  on  the  same  kind  of 
sunny  autumn  day.  He  was  sitting  there  under 
the  trees  on  a  bench  near  Nassau  Hall  waiting 
for  the  world  to  clear  up  and  for  something  to 
happen  to  him.     But  now  the  roles  were  inverted 


152    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

and  I  was  going  around  doing  the  signing  up  for 
the  Pressing  Establishment.  I  even  walked  up  to 
the  frightened  little  chap,  but  I  didn't  ask  him  to 
sign  up,  and  between  three  or  four  of  us  we  cer- 
tainly tried  to  make  him  feel  at  home;  and,  just 
as  I  had  been  given  a  bunk  on  my  first  night,  a 
couple  of  us  now  gave  him  one.  Just  now  he's 
making  the  same  fight  that  I  did,  and  I  wish 
him  luck. 

They  do  call  the  seniors  "grave,"  but  I  don't 
think  they  really  are  so.  They  are  older.  They 
are  men  now,  and  some  of  the  pop  and  efferves- 
cence is  gone.  They  don't  pull  of!  any  boys' 
tricks  because  they've  outgrown  them.  When  a 
freshman  arrives  he  wonders  what  he  is  up  against 
and  he  tries  hard  to  be  a  part  of  something  that 
he  does  not  really  understand.  A  senior  knows 
what  he's  here  for,  and  he  knows,  too,  that  in  the 
near  future  he  is  going  out  to  have  his  share 
of  the  world's  responsibilities.  The  under  class- 
man has  no  sense  of  time,  and  the  sophomore 
lives  and  acts  as  though  college  life  were  going 
to  last  forever.  That's  what  makes  the  soph 
look  so  foolish  to  the  man  outside,  and  I  suppose 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  153 

that's  why  they  call  immature  stuff  sophomoric. 
All  that  I  can  say  is  that  when  I  got  to  senior 
year  I  was  grave  in  comparison  with  what  I 
had  been  as  a  sophomore,  because  I  began  to 
get  whirls  from  the  world  outside,  and  once  in  a 
while  the  thought  of  the  permanent  job,  of  the 
life-work,  came  to  me  as  I  sat  reading  in  my 
room  in  the  evening. 

His  First  Vacation 

College  had  opened  and  we  were  at  it  again. 
The  summer  was  over  and  I  was  feeling  fine.  I 
had  been  at  work  at  a  country  club  in  June  and 
July,  but  illness  at  home  forced  me  to  come  back, 
and,  as  I  could  now  afford  it,  I  did  so.  Fortu- 
nately the  illness  was  not  as  serious  as  we  had 
feared  and  after  a  little  while  my  younger  brother 
and  I  were  free  to  take  time  out.  We  took  a 
bumming  trip  on  an  ice-boat  and  had  bunks  in 
one  of  a  string  of  about  fifty  barges  that  were 
being  towed  up  the  Hudson  by  a  tug.  After 
about  three  days  of  this  rapid  transit  (the  first 
day  we  had  only  made  Grant's  Tomb)  we  struck 
a  little  one-horse  town  and  got  out  on  shore,  and 


iS4    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

on  looking  up  at  one  of  the  corners  I  saw  the  usual 
lager  sign,  with  another  sign  underneath  adver- 
tising a  reading-room.    I  went  in. 

Which  sign  was  it  that  persuaded  me?  The 
other  one.  I  hadn't  seen  a  newspaper  in  three 
days.  There  were  two  elderly  fellows  inside;  one 
had  a  white  apron  around  his  rather  corpulent 
body.  He  didn't  look  like  the  librarian.  He  be- 
longed to  the  other  sign.  The  other  gentleman 
was  a  cripple  of  about  sixty-five,  with  long  white 
whiskers,  and  wore  a  starry  badge.  My  younger 
brother,  who  likes  his  fun  as  well  as  I  do,  whipped 
out  his  handkerchief  and  began  to  shine  the  spot 
on  his  own  coat  where  a  badge  would  have  been 
had  he  worn  one.  The  old  fellow  looked  disap- 
provingly at  this  act  of  lese-majesle,  began  to 
limp  around  impatiently,  and  we  were  promptly 
informed  that  he  was  the  sheriff.  The  sheriff 
looked  us  over  with  an  evil  eye.    I  said: 

"Is  this  a  public  reading-room ? " 

"Well,  ain't  nobody  been  turned  out  of  here 
yet,"  said  the  man  in  the  white  apron. 

"Provided  he  behaves  himself, "  added  the 
sheriff. 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  155 

Well,  we  behaved  ourselves,  and  read  the 
papers,  and  then  moved  on  to  other  sleepy  Rip 
Van  Winkle  villages  and  towns,  and  after  some 
lazy  days  of  this  sort  I  came  back  feeling  ready 
for  anything.  So  I  started  the  new  year  in  first- 
rate  physical  condition. 

One  of  the  main  features  of  the  opening  hey- 
day was  conspicuously  absent.  Horsing  was 
gone.  Requiescat  in  pace.  If  it  was  missed  we 
didn't  notice  it,  and  I  don't  believe  the  freshmen 
missed  it  either. 

Do  I  think  it  a  mark  of  effeminacy  that  hors- 
ing should  have  been  given  up?  No,  I  think  it 
is  a  mark  of  manliness.  We  are  growing  up  and 
changing  with  the  times.  It  may  have  been  neces- 
sary once,  but  I  don't  think  it  is  any  longer. 

Closing  the  Books 

How  about  my  treasurer's  bill?  Oh,  that  was 
all  right.  I  received  my  usual  notice  from  the 
treasurer  that  he  would  like  to  have  me  pay  up 
my  balance,  as  he  "wished  to  close  his  books." 
I  went  in  and  told  him  to  go  ahead  and  close  his 
books,  not  to  mind  me;  then  I  assured  him  that 


156    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

he  would  be  paid  in  Mo  before  I  was  graduated, 
but  what  I  needed  was  a  little  time.  Even  now 
at  the  end  of  the  year  there  is  a  slight  bill  against 
me,  but  it  will  be  cleared  away  before  I  bid 
him  good-by.  We  are  the  best  of  friends.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  so  far  as  I  know,  I  haven't  an 
enemy  in  the  place,  and  I  certainly  bear  no 
grudge  against  any  one. 

Things  went  along  swimmingly.  I  think  I  told 
you  it  was  one  long  joy-ride.  That's  no  mere 
talk.  It's  a  fact.  If  any  one  has  ever  had  a  better 
time  than  I  have  had  this  year,  I'd  like  to  shake 
hands  with  that  man. 

You  want  to  know  something  about  my  new 
schemes?  They  were  of  all  kinds.  I  started  to 
raise  the  sales  of  the  New  York  Times,  That  was 
a  failure.  But  I  have  just  now  come  back  from  a 
trip  as  advertising  agent  for  the  Granville  Barker 
Greek  plays  at  Princeton,  and  I  have  earned 
nearly  as  much  in  a  week  as  I  did  in  a  term  as  a 
freshman.  I'm  strong  for  Lilian  McCarthy  and 
Iphigenia.  Of  many  others  I  will  give  you  only 
the  instance  which  I  think  gave  me  most  satis- 
faction. Our  new  stadium  was  to  be  ready  for 
the  Yale  game,  and,  as  this  was  a  very  special 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  157 

occasion,  a  number  of  us  decided  that  we  ought 
to  have  some  particular  thing  which  could  be 
kept  as  a  souvenir  of  this  date  in  the  college  his- 
tory. Two  men  got  up  a  special  programme. 
One  of  them  is  the  fellow  I  told  you  about  who 
can  do  everything  and  who  does  it  well — my 
partner,  in  other  words.  I  certainly  congratu- 
late myself  on  having  a  friend  like  that.  It's 
worth  the  college  course.  This  time  I  took  com- 
plete charge  of  the  selling.  You  remember  what 
that  programme  was — one  of  the  best  things  in 
that  line  we've  ever  gotten  out  here.  The  de- 
mand far  exceeded  the  supply,  though  we  ordered 
three  times  as  many  as  had  ever  been  used  be- 
fore on  similar  occasions. 

Keen  Competition 

Did  I  ever  have  any  competition  in  selling 
programmes?  I  surely  did.  I  once  ran  into  an 
outsider,  and  I  have  to  smile  now  when  I  think 
of  the  mean  trick  I  played  him.  It  was  pretty 
tough,  but  I  had  to  do  it — and  he  was  in  the 
wrong.  It  was  the  first  time  I  had  ever  been 
put  in  charge  of  selling  the  programmes,  and  the 
secretary  had  made  it  perfectly  plain  to  me  that 


158    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  was  on  trial;  and  it  was  in  the  days  when  I  had 
to  have  jobs  to  live. 

This  is  what  happened.  When  I  got  down  to 
the  field  and  had  distributed  the  programmes  to 
the  men  selling  for  me  and  had  assigned  them 
their  places,  I  found  that  a  New  York  firm  had 
gotten  out  a  programme  that  had  ours  beat.  This 
often  happened  in  those  days.  Besides,  they  had 
street  urchins  to  sell  them,  and,  between  you  and 
me,  they  are  usually  better  salesmen  than  stu- 
dents. They're  more  impudent  and  persistent 
and  can  snake  through  a  crowd.  Against  that 
combination  I  didn't  stand  a  chance,  and  for  a 
while  I  had  to  watch  their  manager  sell  his  pro- 
grammes while  my  men  were  getting  the  cold 
shoulder;  and  I  was  thinking  about  what  the 
secretary  would  say  to  me  when  I  carried  back 
the  bundles  of  unsold  programmes.  I  had  an 
idea,  and  called  over  Hank  the  cop.    I  said: 

"Hank,  go  over  and  see  whether  that  man 
has  a  permit  to  sell.  If  he  hasn't,  arrest  him  for 
selling  without  a  license,  take  him  to  the  town 
hall,  and  make  him  buy  one.  Don't  hurry, 
Hank;  there's  lots  of  time." 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  159 

In  my  desperation  I  had  hit  the  weak  spot 
in  my  competitor's  armor,  and  by  the  time  he 
had  walked  a  half-mile  to  the  town  hall,  gone 
through  the  formalities,  and  returned  I  had  sold 
my  programmes.  For  the  rest  of  the  day  I  left 
the  field  to  him. 

But  last  fall  at  that  stadium  opening  we  had 
a  programme  that  could  compete  to  advantage 
with  anything  on  the  market,  and  we  didn't 
have  to  bother  about  the  other  fellows. 

You  remember  my  first  experience  in  selling 
programmes  was  as  a  freshman  on  the  day  of  the 
Harvard-Princeton  game,  and  I  felt  then  that  the 
five  dollars  I  earned  was  the  easiest  money  ever. 
At  this  game  I  had  to  look  after  about  forty  men 
who  were  selling  programmes  as  I  had  sold  them 
then.  Each  of  those  men  was  getting  twice  as 
much  on  every  sale  as  I  had  earned  as  a  fresh- 
man, and  the  heaps  of  programmes  in  their  arms 
were  simply  melting  away.  My  own  share  in  the 
day's  work,  or  rather  in  all  the  work  that  led  up 
to  that  day,  amounted  to  just  about  thirty-five 
times  what  I  had  cashed  in  for  that  first  ex- 
perience. 


i6o    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

Taking  a  Loaf 

Well,  wealth  never  did  sit  well  on  my  shoul- 
ders. Oh,  yes,  I  kept  at  my  regular  work.  I 
was  manager  of  the  Pressing  Establishment,  did 
my  work  in  the  Distributing  Agency,  at  the 
commons,  and  in  the  new  schemes  that  turned 
up  from  time  to  time.  But  I  suppose  I  felt  too 
good  over  the  success  of  that  programme.  At 
Thanksgiving  I  went  home  for  only  a  day  and 
then  rushed  off  to  spend  the  rest  of  the  time 
up  in  New  York  State  at  my  roommate's.  But 
after  Thanksgiving  I  ran  into  a  slump  and  loafed 
until  Christmas.  I  loafed  so  obtrusively  that  it 
got  on  my  roommate's  nerves,  and  I  did  it  so 
hard  that  after  loafing  for  three  weeks  I  had 
to  go  home  for  a  vacation.  Most  of  the  time 
I  spent  at  parties.  Yes,  theatre  and  dancing 
parties. 

But  I  came  back  and  got  into  the  mill  again 
and  began  to  grind  once  more. 

Did  I  still  have  that  old  feeling  of  constraint? 
No,  I  didn't  have  it  as  I  had  it  in  freshman  year, 
but  a  little  of  it  was  left.    You  will  remember  my 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  161 

telling  you  that  I  had  to  learn  the  way  of  life 
of  the  undergrads,  and  that  when  I  arrived  in 
Princeton  I  didn't  know  what  a  dessert  was.  I 
had  about  caught  up  now  and  had  come  to  a 
decision.  For  two  years  I  had  tried  to  do  as  they 
did.  Now  I  was  feeling  far  easier  and  freer  in 
manner  and  speech.  You  can't  help  but  improve 
unconsciously,  and  I  had  at  times  made  a  con- 
scious effort.  But  now  I  had  the  sense  of  having 
served  my  apprenticeship  and  could  act  pretty 
much  as  they  did.  But  in  many  things  I  decided 
that  I  preferred  to  be  myself. 

In  what  way?  Oh,  in  many  ways.  My  use 
of  language,  for  instance.  Do  I  use  slang  to  my 
professors?  Of  course  not.  But  when  I  wish  to 
talk  to  a  man  that  I  know,  I  do  it  in  my  own  lan- 
guage, and  if  slang  expresses  it  better  I  use  slang. 
If  you  have  something  to  say  to  the  other  fellow, 
the  important  thing  is  to  have  him  get  it. 

Two  Years  to  Make  a  College  Man 

Had  my  attitude  toward  college  changed  ?  Cer- 
tainly. All  this  helped  to  bring  about  a  change. 
During  the  first  two  years,  besides  feeling  strange 


i62    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

I  had  the  feeling  of  being  handicapped.  My  pre- 
vious training  had  not  been  of  the  best,  and  the 
ways  of  college  life,  as  well  as  the  ways  of  men 
generally,  were  new.  Two  years  of  running  up 
against  the  same  thing  and  going  through  the 
same  mill  had  brought  out  fairly  similar  products. 

If  you  want  my  opinion,  it  is  this.  It  takes  two 
years  to  make  a  college  student;  it  takes  two  more 
to  let  him  make  of  himself  a  college  graduate. 
In  junior  and  senior  years  I  no  longer  had  any 
sense  of  being  handicapped;  I  felt  that  we  were 
all  running  from  scratch  and  it  was  a  fair  field 
and  no  favor.  If  some  of  us  did  fall  behind,  it 
was  our  own  fault. 

Had  I  acquired  the  feeling  of  independence? 
Yes,  I  felt  that  all  doors  were  open  and  I  could 
come  and  go  as  I  chose.  That  is  the  feeling  I 
now  had  about  the  world  at  large,  and  it  is  one  of 
the  finest  things  my  coming  to  college  has  given 
me.  I  now  feel  that  I  can  circulate  freely  not 
only  in  the  class  in  which  I  grew  up  but  with 
all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men.  But  you  can 
have  independence  and  not  have  confidence.  I 
was  now  beginning  to  be  in  that  stage.     Yes,  I 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  163 

had  had  enterprise  before,  but  not  confidence. 
What  gave  it  to  me  ?    I  will  tell  you  what  helped. 

In  my  junior  year  I  needed  money,  and  wrote 
to  my  partner,  who  was  out  of  town.  I  told  him: 
"I  have  a  deal  on  hand;  send  me  fifty  dollars.' ' 
That  isn't  the  way  they  did  things  where  I  came 
from.  He  showed  his  absolute  faith  in  me  by 
sending  it  on  the  next  mail  with  no  questions 
asked.  By  advancing  that  sum  in  that  way  he 
did  far  more  than  show  fifty  dollars'  worth  of 
confidence  in  me.  He  gave  me  confidence  itself, 
because  when  some  one  else  has  faith  in  you  and 
shows  it  you  can't  help  getting  a  little  yourself. 
When  the  check  fell  out  of  his  letter  I  beamed 
all  over  inside.    That  was  the  start. 

Of  course,  I  was  seeing  a  great  deal  more  of  the 
fellows  than  I  had  ever  done  before.  I  was  in 
my  room  more  of  the  time  and  in  the  rooms  of 
my  friends.  We  went  to  the  movies  together, 
shot  a  jigger  now  and  then,  and  in  the  evening 
smoked  a  pipe  and  had  a  talk.  I  tell  you  I  en- 
joyed some  of  those  talks.  I  said  once  that  when 
I  came  I  didn't  have  the  feeling  that  I  belonged 
here,    That  was  still  true  in  a  sense.     I  don't 


i64    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

mean  that  I  still  felt  lost.  That  was  gone  long 
ago,  but  I  didn't  feel  perfectly  natural.  There 
was  so  much  of  the  unexpected  in  this  college 
world  for  me  that  every  now  and  then  some- 
thing still  bobs  up  to  prove  that  I  haven't  learned 
everything  about  it  yet.  It's  a  little  bit  like  the 
feeling  a  man  has  just  before  an  examination 
when  he  isn't  well  prepared.  I  didn't  have  the 
ways  of  society  down  cold,  that's  what  I  mean. 
I  can  illustrate. 

The  other  day  I  saw  a  classmate  who  has 
worked  his  way  like  myself  walking  along  the 
campus  with  a  young  lady.  I  met  him  later  and 
began  to  jolly  him  about  it.  I  said  he  looked 
unnatural,  uncomfortable,  and  lost.  He  immedi- 
ately took  me  up  and  offered  to  prove  to  me 
that  he  was  perfectly  natural.  He  did.  This  is 
the  way  he  put  it: 

"For  me  it  is  natural  to  feel  unnatural,  uncom- 
fortable, and  lost  when  I  am  walking  along  the 
campus  with  a  young  lady." 

"You  win,"  I  said. 

I  guess  he  had  it  on  me.  I  didn't  feel  perfectly 
at  home,  but  I  was  getting  used  to  it,  and  of 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  165 

course  I  am  now  far  more  comfortable  in  any 
kind  of  life  than  I  ever  was  before. 

"The  Ballad  of  Hard-Luck  Henry" 

Do  you  know  "The  Ballad  of  Hard-Luck 
Henry"?    Well, 

"Hard-Luck  Henry  he  was  hoodoo-proof, 
He  knew  the  way  to  lose." 

That's  pretty  much  the  case.  I  don't  want  to 
pull  any  rah-rah  or  virtuoso  stuff,  but  I  want  to 
make  you  understand  if  I  can.  It's  like  this. 
A  fellow  in  my  situation  is  bound  to  make  mis- 
takes. He  is  living  in  a  different  class  of  society 
and  more  or  less  frequently  he  puts  his  foot  into 
it.  Well,  I  had  grown  accustomed  to  making  my 
occasional  slip.  I  was  becoming  hoodoo-proof, 
and  conscious  that  I  was  not  at  home,  but  I  was 
not  yet  conscious  of  the  mistakes  I  made  when  I 
made  them.  I  always  became  conscious  of  them 
later. 

In  those  conversations  with  the  other  boys — 
and  we  had  many  heart-to-heart  talks  that  went 
to  rock-bottom — I  have  learned  that  there  is  a 


166    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

difference  between  fellows  who  come  to  college 
as  I  did  and  enter  what  might  be  called  a  strange 
world,  and  the  fellows  to  the  manner  born.  It's 
a  question  of  psychology,  a  sort  of  dual-person- 
ality effect.  Any  time  when  I  got  back  into  my 
room  after  having  been  out  in  a  crowd,  especially 
if  it  had  been  a  mixed  company,  I  would  sit 
down  and  begin  to  view  myself  objectively.  I 
would  see  myself — yes,  literally  see  myself — as 
if  I  were  there  on  the  stage  going  through  all  the 
scenes  of  that  gathering,  and  criticise  myself  as 
I  would  an  actor.  My  self  in  these  situations 
was  an  entire  stranger  to  me.  I  mean  that  lit- 
erally. I  was  at  the  same  time  audience  and 
actor,  and  usually  I  would  end  up  by  saying: 

"Oh,  what  a  dub  you  are!  Why  didn't  you 
say  so-and-so?  Why  didn't  you  do  this  instead 
of  that?" 

And  each  time  I  had  learned  something.  But, 
after  all  is  said  and  done,  I'd  rather  get  "ham 

and "  down  on  Park  Row  than  dine  a  la  mode 

at  the  Astor. 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  167 

By  Way  of  Diversion 

What  sort  of  amusement  did  I  have?  Every- 
thing was  an  amusement  as  I  look  back  at  it 
now.  The  joke  was  either  on  me  or  on  somebody 
else,  and  I  enjoyed  it  coming  or  going.  You 
know  the  line: 

"If  you're  up  against  it  badly,  then  it's  only  one  on  you." 

At  that  I  wasn't  up  against  it  very  often  or 
very  hard. 

Yes,  out  of  the  faculty  and  out  of  my  lessons 
I  was  getting  pure  enjoyment.  No,  I  prefer  not 
to  talk  about  what  I  got  from  books,  because  I 
suppose  it's  much  the  same  sort  of  thing  the  other 
fellows  get  out  of  them.  There  was,  to  be  sure, 
now  and  then  a  lecture  or  lesson  that  was  dry  as 
dust,  but  out  of  most  of  them  I  got  immense  en- 
joyment, and  especially,  ever  since  my  freshman 
year,  out  of  my  preceptorials.  Honestly,  I  don't 
know  anything  I  enjoyed  more  than  preceptorial 
conferences  with  a  good  preceptor — everybody 
informal,  everybody  at  home,  everybody  speaking 
his  mind.    The  sense  of  work  was  gone,  but  you 


168    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

had  the  sense  of  wrestling  with  ideas  and  getting 
both  pleasure  and  profit  out  of  them.  But,  in 
addition  to  the  pleasure  I  got  out  of  what  study- 
ing I  did,  it  was  a  great  satisfaction  to  me  to  feel 
that  I  was  getting  also  business  training,  inde- 
pendence, and  confidence  in  myself. 

One  Grand  Recreation 

I  want  to  repeat  that  I  have  had  a  wonderful 
time.  That's  the  impression  I  want  you  to  get. 
This  place  has  been  one  grand  recreation,  and 
this  campus  comes  as  near  being  a  Utopia  as  any- 
thing I  have  ever  seen.  You  must  remember 
what  I  told  you  before,  that  the  kindliness  of 
the  fooling  was  something  new  to  me,  and  there 
was  something  particularly  pleasing  in  the  at- 
titude of  good-fellowship  and  friendliness  that 
prevails. 

As  I  look  back  at  it  now  I  feel  I  got  a  great 
deal  out  of  it.  Most  of  it  didn't  come  in  the  way 
I  had  expected.  It  didn't  come  from  books.  To 
me  the  greatest  thing  was  learning  how  to  talk 
and  deal  with  my  fellow  men,  and  the  oppor- 
tunity which  I  have  had  of  meeting  fellows  from 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  169 

all  walks  of  life  and  all  parts  of  the  country  in 
the  friendly  and  intimate  way  which  I  could 
never  have  enjoyed  otherwise.  Ninety  per  cent 
you  are  glad  to  know;  nine  per  cent  you  are  very 
glad  to  know;  and  one  per  cent  you  wouldn't 
have  missed  knowing  for  your  life.  I  suppose 
the  thing  I  treasure  most  about  it  is  my  friends. 

In  business,  if  I  had  gone  into  it,  instead  of 
coming  to  college,  I  am  sure  that  I  would  have 
gotten  a  different  standpoint  and  one  which  would 
have  given  me  far  less  satisfaction  in  life.  When 
I  came  here  I  held  the  opinion  that  everybody 
was  trying  to  do  you;  that  was  the  way  of  the 
world  as  I  had  seen  it  until  then.  I  think  I  told 
you  that  the  confidence  and  respect  I  had  learned 
to  have  for  my  fellow  man  meant  a  great  deal  to 
me.  Then  you  can't  help  being  a  little  more 
tolerant  after  seeing  different  classes  of  fellows 
and  learning  their  various  characteristics.  I  re- 
spect any  one's  belief  now,  even  if  it's  in  the 
white  elephant. 

Well,  this  sense  of  close  friendship  and  unity 
of  interest  with  many  men  is  more  to  me  than 
anything  else,  because  I  never  dreamed  that  it 


170    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

could  exist.  Yes,  college  men  are  different  as  a 
class  from  the  men  I  would  have  met  outside. 
If  before  I  came  here  I  had  met  some  one  who 
was  doing  something  shady  I  would  have  said: 
"Well,  that's  life."  But  if  now  after  I  get  out 
I  should  run  across  any  classmate  of  mine  doing 
something  crooked,  it  would  break  me  up  pretty 
badly.  And,  between  you  and  me,  I  don't  think 
that  will  happen. 

Well,  since  this  last  spring  came  my  life  with 
my  classmates  here  has  been  a  delight  which  I 
could  not  describe.  Of  course,  college  students 
have  faults  that  are  peculiarly  their  own.  One 
of  them  is  the  notion  that  they  are  superior  to 
the  men  outside.  It's  not  to  be  wondered  at. 
We  have  been  down  here  for  four  years,  and 
every  man  of  national  or  international  reputation 
who  has  come  to  lecture  has  spoken  about  like 
this: 

"You  are  the  men  who  are  going  to  be  the 
leaders  of  the  nation." 

We  get  it  from  all  sides,  and  pretty  soon  some 
of  us  fool  ourselves  into  the  belief  that  it's  true, 
and  when  such  a  chap  goes  out  he  looks  at  the 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  171 

poor  shopkeeper  or  laborer  from  pretty  far  up 
and  says: 

"You  poor  boob,  who  are  you?  I  am  a  leader 
of  the  nation." 

What  Might  Have  Been 

What  would  I  have  done  if  I  had  never  come 
to  college  and  had  stayed  at  home?  The  chances 
are  that  I  would  have  done  what  almost  every- 
body else  around  there  was  doing.  I  would  have 
gone  down  to  the  rubber-mill.  In  that  case  it 
would  now  be  about  time  for  me  to  be  showing 
traces  of  tuberculosis.  It's  literally  true  that  on 
an  average  down  there  they  get  a  touch  of  tuber- 
culosis after  four  years  and  in  ten  years  are 
physical  wrecks.  I  know  a  great  many  fellows 
who  were  brought  up  with  me  who  have  gone  to 
pieces  in  that  rubber-mill. 

Why  should  I  regret  that  I  had  to  work  my 
way?  After  my  first  year  I  could  have  stopped 
work.  I  didn't  want  to.  There  are  always  a 
lot  of  people  who  want  to  help  you  and  make  it 
easy  for  you.  At  the  end  of  my  sophomore  year 
the  father  of  one  of  my  classmates  very  gener- 


172    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

ously  offered  to  loan  me  the  money  to  pay  my 
expenses.  I  certainly  appreciated  the  spirit  in 
which  that  offer  was  made.  But  long  before  that 
time  I  had  made  up  my  mind  that  I  was  going 
to  see  this  thing  through  myself,  and  I  was 
having  so  good  a  time  that  I  hated  to  let  any  one 
else  in  on  it.  If  I  have  stolen  some  of  the  time 
from  my  studies  and  devoted  it  to  business,  I 
don't  think  that  time  has  been  wasted  in  any 
sense,  and,  though  I  should  have  liked  to  have 
earned  my  Phi  Beta  Kappa  key,  I'm  satisfied  as  it 
is.  So  are  the  folks  at  home,  who,  with  the  peo- 
ple in  the  old  neighborhood,  were  doubtful  when 
I  first  made  my  long  fifty-mile  journey.  Since 
things  have  gone  so  well  with  me,  as  they  will 
with  any  one,  three  other  fellows  have  come 
from  my  old  school,  so  that  there  are  four  of  us 
now.  One  of  them  is  my  brother,  and  I  have 
two  more  who  are  now  anxious  to  come  to  college. 

Looking  Forward 

What  am  I  going  to  do  next?  Oh,  I'm  not 
worrying.  At  the  time  when  I  came  down  here 
as  a  freshman  I  was  uncertain  about  everything. 


A  SENIOR  AT  LAST  173 

I  had  my  fists  clinched.  It  was  the  feeling  that 
everybody  was  going  to  try  to  knock  me  off  my 
feet.  It's  different  now.  I  have  the  feeling  that 
everything  is  going  to  turn  out  all  right.  I  re- 
member one  of  my  preceptors  told  us  that  when 
Alexandre  Dumas  first  came  to  Paris  he  had 
twenty  francs,  and  that  after  having  made  mil- 
lions and  lost  them,  on  his  death-bed  he  called 
his  son  to  him  and  said:  "They  reproach  me 
with  having  been  prodigal.  It's  no  such  thing. 
I  came  to  Paris  with  twenty  francs.  I  have  kept 
them.  There  they  are."  And  he  pointed  to  the 
purse  on  the  mantel.  It  contained  just  twenty 
francs.  That's  all  he  had  left,  but  he  was  satis- 
fied to  have  broken  even  in  this  game  of  life. 

Well,  when  I  came  to  Princeton  first  I  had 
three  dollars.  I  have  saved  money.  I'll  have  at 
least  that  much  when  I  leave.  So  I  shall  cer- 
tainly be  as  rich  as  I  was  then,  and  I'm  carrying 
away  with  me  a  lot  that  you  can't  measure  in 
money. 


i74    COLLEGE  ON  NOTHING  A  YEAR 

The  Wide,  Wide  World 

I  am  booked  up  to  June  15,  and  I  hate  to 
look  ahead  to  the  time  when  they  begin  to  put 
the  fellows  through  the  car-windows,  and  when 
our  little  crowd  dwindles  away.  It  makes  me 
feel  pretty  blue  to  think  that  very  soon  this  class, 
with  which  I  have  spent  the  best  four  years  of 
my  life,  will  scatter  and  never  meet  again  with 
all  present.  For  even  at  reunions  some  will  be1 
absent.  It  sort  of  breaks  you  up — you  can't! 
help  it.  I  hate  to  think  of  leaving  them,  but  I 
am  anxious  to  get  started.  And,  of  course,  at 
first  I  shall  go  home. 

No,  I'm  not  going  to  stick  in  my  old  town. 
After  a  few  days  I'll  make  my  start  at  something, 
and  it  will  be:  "Good-by,  mother;  so-long,  folks; 
I'm  going." 

Me  for  the  "wide,  wide  world." 


A  LTT  -    'ry 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 
LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 

Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


- 


(/C-LO 


INTER  LIBRARY 


LO 


PT 


NON-RENEWABLE 


BECCIB.    m  02  '75 


SEP 


151993 


1 


oct  2o  ttec   AUTODiSCORC  JUN16 


33 


l4Dec'6lPA 


kt 


*im 


)  CD 


AUTO  DISC  CIRC    JUN  16*93 


DEC    *  "661 


»CTfe 


AUTO  .DISC  CIRC  JUL  31 '93 


AY  20 


OUI  1  B  1975  2  5 


LD  21A-50m-8,'57 
(C8481sl0)476B 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


YB  44649 


-i 


325758 


9s 


3 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CAUFORNIA  LIBRARY 


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